Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid crashed to the floor after getting tripped by Pascal Siakam in the fourth quarter of a win against the Toronto Raptors on Thursday in Philadelphia. Photo by Peter Foley/EPA-EFE
May 3 (UPI) -- The Philadelphia 76ers and Toronto Raptors showed the dirty plays that come with playoff basketball in Game 3 of their Eastern Conference semifinals series.
One of the first questionable plays came in the second quarter, when Sixers guard Ben Simmons threw an elbow into Kyle Lowry's groin while Simmons was on the ground in front of the Raptors star. Lowry was boxing Simmons out under the rim during that possession before Simmons jumped up and attempted to get a rebound.
Simmons fell to the ground and threw his elbow up between Lowry's legs after the play, but he was not given a foul.
"It was an elbow, but the refs didn't call it," Lowry told reporters. "I'm not going to dwell on something that wasn't called."
But Pascal Siakam's fourth-quarter sequence was much more obvious when it came to issuing a flagrant foul. Siakam was driving toward the rim for the Raptors during that possession. Joel Embiid was defending during the play and knocked the ball loose as Siakam fell to the ground.
Embiid went to grab the loose ball, but Siakam stuck out his right leg and tripped the Sixers big man, sending him crashing to the court. Siakam was given a flagrant type 1 foul for his actions. Embiid made both of his resulting free throws.
Siakam apologized after the game.
"Embiid, that's my guy," Siakam said. "I didn't want to hurt him. It's something I thought was a no-call. I was frustrated. I don't know what I was doing. I didn't mean to hurt him or anything like that."
The Sixers big man had 33 points, 10 rebounds, five blocks and three assists in the win. Siakam had 20 points and three rebounds in the loss. Kawhi Leonard led the Raptors with 33 points.
