{"id":707511,"date":"2026-04-10T16:16:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T16:16:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/707511\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T16:16:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T16:16:16","slug":"playoff-hopes-on-the-line-for-both-the-sixers-and-the-flyers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/707511\/","title":{"rendered":"Playoff hopes on the line for both the Sixers and the Flyers"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — Hopes of making the playoffs are on the line for the 76ers<\/a> and the Flyers<\/a> as both Philadelphia teams near the end of their regular seasons.<\/p>\n

Both teams lost important games on Thursday night, making their final few regular-season games that much more important.<\/p>\n

“Both seem like they’re really close,” said fan Jacob Zall of South Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

The Flyers feel confident, but their head coach says they need more discipline after Thursday night’s loss<\/a> was filled with penalties.<\/p>\n

“You just can’t punch a guy in the head, or you can’t rip a guy’s helmet off. It makes no sense. That isn’t tough hockey,” said Flyers head coach Rick Tocchet.<\/p>\n

The Sixers appear to have a harder path.<\/p>\n

They lost Thursday night in Houston while their star center Joel Embiid was undergoing surgery to have his appendix removed<\/a> at a hospital there.<\/p>\n

“I’ve had appendix surgery myself,” Zall said, “I hope he recovers quickly.”<\/p>\n

Embiid has bounced back from half a dozen surgeries over his 12 years in the NBA, but it’ll likely take a few weeks for him to recover from abdominal surgery and to become competitive again.<\/p>\n

The Sixers are trying to avoid the play-in tournament next week, where lower-seeded teams have to compete to make the playoffs.<\/p>\n

“I definitely think they can make the first round,” said fan Mark Hill of South Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

“If they can get past the first round and get Embiid back, I think they got a shot,” Heckstall said.<\/p>\n

As for the Flyers, they got whipped 6-3, but are still holding onto the third and final playoff spot.<\/p>\n

However, other teams are closing in with just three games left in the regular season.<\/p>\n

“They need to win. They’re neck and necked the Islanders. I know they’re one point off and they’re fighting for that last spot,” Zall said.<\/p>\n

Hockey playoffs start next Saturday, April 18.<\/p>\n

Postseason play for the NBA starts early next week, depending on how teams finish the regular season.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 WPVI-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — Hopes of making the playoffs are on the line for the 76ers and the Flyers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":707512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3769],"tags":[88497,679,7,6,678,207,3817],"class_list":{"0":"post-707511","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-76ers","8":"tag-88497","9":"tag-76ers","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-nba","12":"tag-philadelphia","13":"tag-philadelphia-76ers","14":"tag-philadelphia76ers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116381311654531536","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=707511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/707511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/707512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=707511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=707511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=707511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}