Tyrese Maxey saw it coming. Less than four minutes into Game 2, hed just rebounded a missed corner 3 by Josh Hart and turned upcourt. With his Philadelphia 76ers trailing by one in both the game and the series he knew he needed to make something happen. And he knew the New York Knicks werent particularly keen on letting him do that.As he crossed half-court, Maxey was greeted by the placid countenance and exceedingly long arms of Mikal Bridges, his primary matchup for nearly all of the first two games of the Eastern Conference semifinals. They faced off as Maxey dribbled on the right wing, about 35 feet away from the basket, and called for a ball screen.Andre Drummond ambled up to set it. Thats important, because while Andre Drummond is a great many things a historically excellent rebounder, a person nicknamed Big Penguin for reasons even he doesnt understand, someone who became a shockingly good corner 3-point shooter 14 years into his career, etc. he is not Joel Embiid.Embiid, even in his injury-ravaged form, remains one of the most lethally efficient scorers in the world someone youd have to worry about torching your defense if you left him alone. Drummond, corner triples and tip-toe tip-ins aside, is not. But Embiid wasnt available in Game 2, so, here comes Andre.The Knicks are cranking up the heat on 76ers All-Star Tyrese Maxey. (Dustin Satloff/Getty Images)Dustin Satloff via Getty ImagesThis is why, as Drummond approached Maxey, his defender did, too. Rather than playing drop coverage in the pick-and-roll a tactic that would call for him to stay below the level of the screen and sink back toward the paint, with walling off a drive and protecting the rim as his primary objectives Karl-Anthony Towns sprinted up toward the sideline, stationing himself on Maxeys right-hand side.Before Drummond could even fully set his screen, Maxey leapt and fired a pass across the width of the court to Paul George. He quickly swung it to Kelly Oubre Jr., guarded by Jalen Brunson the weak link on a New York defense that has ranked fourth in the NBA points allowed per possession since Christmas, and someone the Sixers want to attack whenever possible.As Oubre, much more comfortable finishing plays than creating them, drove toward the paint, OG Anunoby sliced his right hand into Oubres dribble. The pressure led Oubre to lose the ball, which squirted out into the aforementioned exceedingly long arms of Bridges. Possession over; threat neutralized.Its just one relatively innocuous possession in a game filled with plenty of other twists and turns that produced a 108-102 Knicks win. But its instructive, because it laid bare how New York wants to deal with Maxey especially when Embiid isnt available, and its unclear if he will be for Game 3 on Friday.Mainly, they were just putting two on the ball, you know what I mean? Maxey said after Game 2. Every ball screen, every action, every switch, they would just put two on the ball, and I was just getting rid of it, getting off of it. Yeah, thats really it. I was just trying to create and do different things like that, and just use my gravity.By putting two defenders directly in Maxeys path, the Knicks aim to make him make a decision: Either try to navigate through that traffic, or pass the ball away to a teammate. If he opts for the former, New York can deploy its long arms and physicality to make it tough for Maxey to find open space, thus potentially forcing a contested look or a turnover. (On the highlighted possession, with Bridges positioned to Maxeys left, the Knicks are looking to force the ball down the sideline, icing the pick-and-roll to keep the ball out of the middle of the floor. If Bridges opens his stance up, with Towns stationed on Maxeys right, they could work to force him to his non-dominant left hand a strategy called weaking the pick-and-roll with Anunoby waiting at the nail and poised to spring help.)And if Maxey goes with Option B well, then a non-All-NBA player is the one commanding the 76ers offense, which is an outcome the Knicks are just fine with, thanks.I think Tyrese is so good that obviously hes gotta require a trap, said Edgecombe, who scored 17 points on 6-for-13 shooting in Game 2, but committed four turnovers against three assists in his 40 minutes of floor time. I think they just wanted someone else to beat them, regardless of who it is. Just not Tyrese.The Knicks sprinkled in some dialed-up aggression on Maxey in Game 1, with mixed results but head coach Mike Brown didnt lean too hard in the direction of bringing the heat, due at least in part to the presence of the former MVP looming as a potential source of pain. In Game 2, though, with Embiid out and an understanding that the Sixers best chance of getting even was Maxey going nuclear, Brown decided it was time to bring the house.You know, if you give a great player the same dose of coverage the whole game, he's gonna tear you apart, Brown said after Game 2. And so, you know, we went to some blitzing and double-teaming him, and then we took it off, then we put it back on. You have to do that.The Sixers did have some success playing out of those traps in Game 2, with Maxey able to hit a release-valve teammate in the pocket to play 4-on-3 or kickstart swing-swing sequences leading to either open looks or drives against rotating defenders:I thought our guys did a really good job of making the right reads, 76ers head coach Nick Nurse said after Game 2. I thought we passed the ball good.But the Knicks got what they were looking for out of the cranked-up pressure on plenty of trips, too, whether by jumping the passing lane after the trap to force a turnover or just by forcing another Sixer to make enough plays and shots to beat them:When you do blitz, or when you do double-team, you have to be OK saying, OK, you know what? Brown said after Game 2. If other guys make shots, like some of the other guys were tonight, and you lose, then hey, you pat them on their back and you tell them, Good game, and you go to the next one.Philadelphias other guys couldnt make enough of those shots in the fourth quarter. George, Edgecombe and Oubre combined to go 1-for-11 from the field in the final frame, part of a dreadful 4-for-19, 12-point finish that allowed the Knicks to escape with the victory.I thought we had maybe four wide open shots in a row that didnt go, Nurse said. We needed to keep the scoreboard moving. We played great offense. We just didnt shot-make.Against the Celtics in Round 1, Maxeys pick-and-rolls including possessions on which he passed to a teammate who shot, drew a foul or committed a turnover generated 1.04 points per possession, according to Synergy Sports Technologys tracking. That wouldve been a near-top-10 mark among high-volume ball-handlers during the regular season. Through two games against New York, though, thats down to 0.972 points per possession a good-but-not-great mark that wouldve been closer to bottom-10 in that high-volume cohort with those possessions ending in a turnover 25% of the time when the Knicks commit a second defender to the actionSeveral of those turnovers came after Maxey kind of jammed [his right pinky] finger in the second quarter of Game 2 an issue that he said left him feeling less confident than usual in his handle and ability to dribble around or split the Knicks traps.So I was just trying to get off the ball and, like, create actions, Maxey said. But thats fine. They can put two on the ball. Im fine with that. Weve just got to get more comfortable making the reads. And Ive gotta I turned the ball over way, way, way too much tonight, especially out of the traps, and Ive gotta do a better job of just staying poised in those traps and make the right play out of it.Sometimes the right play is for Maxey to shoot it himself. He went 2-for-7 from the floor in the fourth quarter, though, and 3-for-9 in the second half a dramatic shift from a red-hot second quarter in which he scored 15 of his team-high 26 points, repeatedly attacking whenever he was matched up against smaller Knick defenders like Miles Deuce McBride and Jose Alvarado. So, what changed after intermission?Mikal Bridges, said Knicks forward Josh Hart. He did what he does, and he took that challenge. And thats why thats our guy. He gave amazing effort.On the defensive side of the ball, I think [Bridges is] just making things tough, said Brunson. I also think Tyrese is generating some good looks for himself and for others, but were just trying to make it as tough as possible, because obviously the things he can do are pretty spectacular.Bridges was a bit more demure in assessing New Yorks second-half success than noted hype-man Hart: I think we just all adjusted and showed a little more shifts, a little more bodies for him. Brown, for his part, saw the answer as being somewhere in the middle.You know, you're not stopping Tyrese Maxey, Brown said. I mean, Tyrese, he had a great game. He had 26 points. But Mikal tried to make him work, especially in the second half, for every point he got, and I think he ended up with seven in the second half. And, you know, you're going to have to keep working and give multiple efforts, and the team defense behind him is going to have to be great in order to even think you're going to slow him down, because he's a great player. But Mikal did what he could, as well as everybody else behind him.They did it, in part, because they werent just behind Bridges they were alongside him, and in Maxeys face, heating him up at every opportunity.They trapped me aggressively, you know what Im saying? Maxey said after the game. They, like, really, really trapped me. It wasnt like a soft trap. So when they trapped me, they trapped me. It was my fault a couple of those times a lot of those times. And Ill be better with that.Hell have to be, especially if Embiids unable to return or limited in his ability to make an offensive impact when he does. Needing to win four times in the next five games is a tall enough order. Doing it while facing constant double-teams for nearly the full 48, though and while your former backup point guard is currently lighting it up in Oklahoma City is a whole new level of pressure.Its going to be like this for the rest of the series, Maxey said. I dont expect anything less.

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There is always baseball happening almost too much baseball for one person to follow themselves. Don't worry, we're here to help you by figuring out what you missed but shouldn't have. Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball: The Athletics let out their frustration by losing the first two games of a three-game series against the Philadelphia Phillies in explosive fashion. How's that? They blasted four home runs, those coming from catcher Shea Langeliers, designated hitter Brent Rooker and infielders Jacob Wilson and Zack Gelof. Langeliers and Rooker each hit two-run homers in the top of the first inning, with the A's then having a three-run third, a three-run fifth and a two-run seventh. All nine starters for the Athletics recorded a hit, with Langeliers, Rooker, Gelof and outfielder Carlos Cortes having multi-hit performances in a 12-1 win. Concurrently, A's starter J.T. Ginn dominated the Phillies' offense over eight innings, giving up just one run and five baserunners (four hits and one walk) and posting eight strikeouts. Philadelphia's one run came off a solo home run from Kyle Schwarber, who's second in the National League with 12 home runs, in the bottom of the fourth. The Athletics stand atop the American League West at 19-18 and are sixth in MLB with a .407 team slugging percentage. Meanwhile, this was the Phillies' second loss of the season by 11 runs; they lost to the Washington Nationals on Mar. 30, 13-2. Like the A's, the Colorado Rockies lost the first two games of a three-game series but salvaged the final game of the set with the long ball. Tied at 2-all with the New York Mets with the bases loaded in the bottom of the eighth, Rockies outfielder Jake McCarthy hammered a fastball on the inside of the plate into the upper level for a go-ahead, grand slam, which ultimately gave Colorado a 6-2 win. McCarthy had five RBIs on the day and was the only Colorado player to have multiple hits. Elsewhere, a fourth-inning RBI single from infielder Willi Castro accounted for the Rockies' sixth run, while the Mets scored their two runs in the top of the second. Through 28 games, McCarthy, who has started extensively in both left and center field for the Rockies, has totaled two home runs, 14 RBIs and a 126 OPS+, while boasting a .275/.346/.507 slash line. The outfielder is in his first year with the Rockies after spending the first five seasons of his MLB career with the Arizona Diamondbacks from 2021-25. The win snapped a six-game losing streak for the Rockies. Pittsburgh Pirates second baseman Brandon Lowe hit a first-inning home run in the team's Wednesday night win over the Diamondbacks and did the same in their Thursday night win over the D-backs, launching a Zac Gallen fastball over the right field wall. An Adrian Del Castillo RBI single in the bottom of the first and a Corbin Carroll solo home run in the third later gave the Diamondbacks the lead. That said, Pittsburgh took the lead for good in the top of the fifth on back-to-back RBI singles from right fielder Ryan O'Hearn and first baseman Spencer Horwitz. Then, in the sixth, catcher Joey Bart, who had two hits, gave the Pirates another run for good measure with a solo homer to center. Meanwhile, Lowe had three of Pittsburgh's seven hits and right-hander Mitch Keller surrendered just two runs over six innings in a 4-2 win for the Pirates. Pittsburgh has won five of its last six games, improving to 21-17. After walking off the Cincinnati Reds in three straight games, the Chicago Cubs made matters easier for themselves in the Thursday matine against their NL Central rival. First, Cubs outfielder Michael Conforto who finished with a game-high three hits produced the game's first run on a solo homer to right field in the bottom of the second. Two innings later, the outpouring of offense commenced, as the Cubs scored seven runs in six consecutive at-bats in the fourth: a Conforto walk, a Dansby Swanson force-out, an RBI single from Pete Crow-Armstrong, a two-run single from Miguel Amaya, an RBI double from Nico Hoerner and a Moiss Ballesteros sacrifice fly. Cincinnati later got solo home runs from second baseman Sal Stewart and outfielder Blake Dunn and an RBI double from left fielder JJ Bleday, but it was to no avail, as Chicago held on to win, 8-3. The Cubs got six reputable innings from left-hander Shota Imanaga, who recorded 10 strikeouts and gave up just one run. Chicago's four-game sweep gives it a nine-game winning streak and puts it in a tie with the Atlanta Braves and New York Yankees for the best record in MLB at 26-12. The Cubs' offense has collectively been among MLB's elite, as they're first in on-base percentage (.353), third in runs (208), fourth in hits (335) and batting average (.258), tied for fourth in home runs (50) and are fifth in slugging percentage (.429). Speaking of the Yankees, in the wake of defeating the Texas Rangers on Thursday and taking two out of three in the series, the Bronx Bombers have now won six consecutive series. New York outfielders Cody Bellinger and Trent Grisham each had three-hit performances, with the former driving in two runs and the latter driving in three runs on a go-ahead, bases-clearing double as part of a six-run bottom of the sixth inning. Infielder Ryan McMahon who entered the game after left fielder Jasson Domnguez was carted off due to a low-grade sprain of his left AC joint, per MLB.com reached base four times (two hits and two walks in five plate appearances). New York used six pitchers in what was a 9-2 victory. As for how the offensive standouts have fared in 2026, Bellinger has racked up five home runs, 28 RBIs and an AL-high 2.5 wins above replacement, while possessing a .299/.394/.530 slash line; it was Grisham's first three-hit game of the season. The Yankees have won 16 of their last 19 games and are 9-2-1 in their 12 series this season. It was all about the one behind the plate for the Washington Nationals in the rubber match of their three-game series with the Minnesota Twins. Trailing 2-0 in the bottom of the third, catcher Keibert Ruiz got the Nationals on the board with an RBI double, which was followed by an RBI sacrifice fly from second baseman Nasim Nuez. Two innings later, Ruiz drove in two more runs with another double. And, two innings later, Ruiz put Washington up for good with a solo home run to right, capping off a three-hit day (all extra-base hits) that saw him drive in four runs. First baseman Curtis Mead drove in another run for the Nationals, his second of the game, in the seventh. While in a 7-5 loss, Twins catcher Ryan Jeffers matched Ruiz, hitting a solo home run, logging two doubles and driving in four runs. Washington has won three of its last four series. After losing the first two games of a four-game series on the road to the Kansas City Royals and scoring no more than three runs in any of those contests, the Cleveland Guardians left Kauffman Stadium with a series split after an offensive breakthrough. Cleveland got out to a three-run lead in the top of the first with a two-run double from first baseman Kyle Manzardo and an RBI single from third baseman Daniel Schneemann. Later, leading 5-2 in the seventh, catcher Bo Naylor blasted a three-run homer to right, which would be a needed oomph, as the Guardians went on to win, 8-5. Naylor and shortstop Brayan Rocchio each had two hits for Cleveland, which got a hit from every member of its starting lineup and 5.1 innings from starter Slade Cecconi. Ironically, the Royals out-hit the Guardians, 12-11, but they wasted a four-hit game from star shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. The Guardians are in first place in the AL Central at 20-19. Literally, they cannot be stopped. Coming off their second consecutive series sweep, the Tampa Bay Rays took the act to Fenway Park on Thursday and won their 13th game in 14 attempts, beating the Boston Red Sox, 8-4. Tampa Bay got three RBIs on two hits from Chandler Simpson and two-hit games from infielders Junior Caminero, Ben Williamson, designated hitter Yandy Diaz and outfielder Jonny DeLuca, as well, as part of a combined 13-hit performance. Caminero put the game out of reach for Tampa Bay with a laser, two-run home run to center in the top of the eighth. The homer was hit at 114.3 mph and traveled 449 feet, according to MLB Stats. The 2025 All-Star third baseman, Caminero, has hit a team-high 10 home runs this season, while boasting a .496 slugging percentage. Meanwhile, Simpson is batting .313, has stolen 12 bases and is tied for sixth in MLB with 45 hits. The Rays (25-12) are a half-game behind the Yankees, Braves and Cubs for the best record in the sport. It wasn't pretty. In fact, the St. Louis Cardinals and San Diego Padres combined for just nine hits, but a win is a win for the Redbirds' sake. The Padres drew first blood with an RBI single from shortstop Xander Bogaerts in the bottom of the first, which was actually a check-swing that traveled 264 feet. At the same time, first baseman Alec Burleson leveled the score for the Cardinals with a solo home run to right in the top of the fourth. And, in the seventh, the Cardinals took a 2-1 lead which would be the final score when shortstop Masyn Winn dropped a ball into right field that got past Nick Castellanos for a triple and brought home the go-ahead run. St. Louis got six plausible innings from left-hander Matthew Liberatore, who surrendered only one run through six innings, while its bullpen surrendered just one baserunner (one hit) over three innings to close out the game. Meanwhile, Cardinals right fielder Jordan Walker, who scored the go-ahead run in the seventh, had two doubles. On the season, Burleson has totaled six home runs, a team-high 30 RBIs and a 132 OPS+, while owning a .270/.350/.461 slash line; Walker has totaled 10 home runs, 27 RBIs, seven stolen bases, a 176 OPS+ and 2.2 wins above replacement, while owning a .309/.383/.588 slash line; Winn is batting .264, while posting 1.3 wins above replacement, sporting a career-high 107 OPS+ and recording two defensive runs saved at shortstop. The Cardinals are in second place in the NL Central at 22-15 and in possession of the first NL wild-card seed. Fittingly, we close out with the only walk off from Thursday's 10-game slate. The Baltimore Orioles and Miami Marlins entered the bottom of the ninth tied at 3-all. Furthermore, Orioles' reliever Andrew Kittredge got the first two batters of the inning out. Then, Miami pinch hit catcher Joe Mack, who doubled, putting the winning run in scoring position. The next at-bat, down 0-1 in the count, Marlins' third baseman Javier Sanoja hit a ground ball to third base, which third baseman Coby Mayo bobbled. That said, Mayo gathered the ground ball, but his throw one-hopped to first baseman Pete Alonso, and the latter couldn't retrieve it off the bounce with the ball getting away from him and Mack coming around third for the walk-off run; the Marlins won, 4-3. As for the rest of the game, Miami struck first in the bottom of the first on a two-run home run by Liam Hicks, giving him 34 RBIs on the year. Miami added another run in the third when first baseman Connor Norby drove in a run on a single, which came after Orioles' shortstop Gunnar Henderson singled in a run in the top half of the inning. Baltimore got its other two runs on a fourth-inning RBI single from right fielder Tyler O'Neill and an eighth-inning RBI single from Alonso.