All right, welcome to the PHLY Sixers podcast on the audio side.

Thanks, everybody, for hanging out with us.

Make sure you check us out on YouTube as well.

But today, we need to talk about the Sixers in the sixth seed.

After taking down the Miami Heat, they extend their lead in the standings in the Eastern Conference, closing the gap on the Toronto Raptors who

were idle on Thursday night. Sixers only trailed the Raptors by one in the standing. So we

kind of wanted to talk about where things are with the Toronto, with the Philadelphia 76ers

in the Eastern Conference standings with 23 games remaining. They are two and a half games back

of the fourth-seated Cleveland Cavaliers, four

games back of the New York Knicks currently.

So, Derek, with that, holding off the Orlando Magic and the Miami Heat.

Oh, by the way, the Atlanta Hawks are not too far back.

Four games behind the 76ers, four and a half games for

the surprising and surging still Charlotte Hornets at 29 and 31. They have some work to do

down the stretch with these 23 games remaining and a couple of common opponents still in there.

Yeah, look, this was a big one against the heat to get that, like you mentioned, they are now a game and a half over the magic, two and a half games over the heat, and they have a chance at that tiebreaker with Miami with one game left to play. So that was a real big one to get. You know, obviously there's still 23 games left, a lot of

work to do and you've got a lot of teams bunched in. You really want to make sure that you, you know, hold on to that top six spot, maybe potentially even move up if you can. You know, it's not like you're going to move into an easy matchup because right now you're looking at the pistons, Celtics, the Knicks and a Cavs as a top four seed.

None of them are necessarily easy matchups.

Some of them you may have, like the Cavs have a little more uncertainty because they just made a big acquisition because James Hardin is currently injured, but none of them are going to be easy matchups. Still, like I said, keeping that top six spot is huge. You want to stay out of that play in tournament if you can.

And that went against the heat really was a big step in that direction.

Yeah, so the next game upcoming for the Sixers is the Boston Celtics.

You pointed out second in the east right now, game and a half.

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