Lost in Tyrese Maxey’s big fourth quarter in Indiana was another checkpoint Joel Embiid quietly hit on the Philadelphia 76ers’ all-time scoring chart.
Embiid moved past Billy Cunningham and into sixth place on the franchise’s scoring list. Cunningham had sat at No. 6 with 13,627 points, while Embiid now stands at 13,630. Next up is Charles Barkley, who is holding onto fifth place.
The gap to Barkley is still sizeable. Embiid needs 554 more points to catch him, and after that the climb gets even steeper with Julius Erving sitting at No.
- Dolph Schayes, Allen Iverson, and Hal Greer round out the rest of the names ahead of Embiid.
With multiple seasons left on his Sixers deal, he has a real shot at catching Barkley and even nudging toward the top four, though health remains the biggest hurdle.
The scoring climb comes with Embiid already off to a productive start this season. He has 86 points through four games, including back-to-back 20-point outings before Philadelphia opened a back-to-back against the Milwaukee Bucks and the Detroit Pistons.
In Wednesday night’s road game against the Indiana Pacers, Embiid logged nearly 39 minutes and scored 21 points. He took 17 shots from the field and made 52.9% of them, missed all three of his three-point attempts, and went 3-for-3 at the line.
The bigger picture is whether he can stay available. If Embiid stays relatively healthy through the 2026-2027 NBA season, his current scoring pace of 21.5 points per game would put Barkley within reach in under 30 games.
That kind of availability has been the question for much of his recent run. Last season, Embiid played 38 games and still finished with more than 1,000 points.
The season before that, he totaled 452 points in 19 games. Over the last three seasons, he has not managed to appear in more than 39 games.
This year has started differently. Embiid has been healthy early, and his knee has not been an issue.
When he missed time last week, the Sixers said his injury designation was plantar fasciitis management. In practice, that meant a night off to rest rather than a major concern.
After another heavy workload in Indiana, Embiid emerged healthy again. Philadelphia now turns to a matchup with the New York Knicks on October 30.
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