Knicks @ 76ers
Friday, 7:00 PM ET | Wells Fargo Center, Philadelphia, PA
The New York Knicks visit Wells Fargo Center Friday night for Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals carrying a 2-0 series lead and the structural pressure on Philadelphia to manufacture a home-court win or stare down a 3-0 hole that has converted to series wins above 96 percent of the time across NBA history. Philadelphia opens as a 1-point home favorite with the total at 213.5 points and the moneyline priced at -112, the closest line of any second-round Game 3 on the entire bracket. The 1-point home line reflects the back-and-forth Game 2 result the 76ers manufactured without Joel Embiid, the Wells Fargo Center home-court premium, and the kind of injury market that is digesting the Anunoby hamstring strain and the Embiid return question simultaneously.
New York's structural identity is built around Jalen Brunson's All-NBA primary-creator workload, the offensive ceiling Karl-Anthony Towns brings at the five, and the wing rotation of Mikal Bridges, OG Anunoby, and Josh Hart that closes out tight games. Brunson controlled the half-court geometry late in Game 2 and Towns provided the inside-outside scoring profile that punished the Embiid-less 76ers, the kind of structural identity that has anchored the Knicks five-game playoff win streak. The piece that defines the Game 3 read is Anunoby's hamstring strain - he leads the Knicks playoff scoring at 21.4 points on 61.9 percent shooting and 53.8 percent from three, with the on-court net rating sitting 6.9 points better than off-court. He is questionable and day-to-day, and the closing-lineup geometry without him reshapes the wing-defender assignment on Tyrese Maxey.
Philadelphia's Game 3 path runs through the Embiid availability and the Maxey-George two-man scoring engine. Joel Embiid is questionable with hip soreness and an ankle sprain after missing Game 2, and any version of Embiid widens the offensive ceiling on the post-up gravity and the free-throw rate. Paul George leads all 2026 playoff players with 31 made threes at 52.5 percent, the kind of secondary-creator three-point geometry that books have weighted heavily into the home line. The home-court energy at Wells Fargo Center is the structural piece that adds the variance windows the road team has to absorb in playoff Game 3s. Tip-off is 7:00 PM ET on Prime Video. The full breakdown is available on the Featured Game of the Day page.