The Sixers won't see either of the Nets' two main stars in Brooklyn.
Kyrie Irving will miss Thursday night's game against the Sixers because of personal reasons.
Nets head coach Steve Nash said pregame Irving's absence is a "private matter" and he's currently unsure how long he will be out as he'd yet to talk with Irving.
Stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Philadelphia sports teams! Sign up here for our All Access Daily newsletter.
Kevin Durant won't play after he was exposed to COVID-19 and forced to quarantine.
Seth Curry, who scored 28 points Wednesday for the Sixers and is shooting 59.5 percent from three-point range, is out with left ankle soreness. Sixers head coach Doc Rivers said Curry hurt his ankle Wednesday and he believes it's a "day-to-day" injury.
Irving and Durant would have posed interesting challenges for the Sixers' defense, which is still rated No. 1 in the NBA, per Cleaning the Glass, after giving up 136 points to the Wizards on Wednesday. The Sixers managed to win despite a career-high 60 points from Bradley Beal, though it appears they have some vulnerabilities against teams with multiple perimeter scoring threats. A Brooklyn team with all of its top talent available certainly fits that description.
In a blowout win Tuesday over the Jazz, the Nets started Irving, Bruce Brown, Taurean Prince, Jeff Green and Jarrett Allen. The Nets' bench is averaging 42.3 points per game, sixth in the league, and Nash has plenty of ways in which he can reshuffle his lineup. Perhaps former Sixer Landry Shamet will start and/or play more than usual to give the Nets some ball handling and shooting. Nash said Allen will start again and have an "incredibly difficult matchup" against Joel Embiid.
NBA
Brooklyn is also without Spencer Diwniddie (partially torn ACL), Nicolas Claxton (right knee tendinopathy), Reggie Perry (left groin soreness) and Tyler Johnson (health and safety protocols). In addition to Curry, Furkan Korkmaz and Mike Scott are sidelined by a left adductor strain and left knee contusion, respectively, while Terrance Ferguson is out because of personal reasons for the Sixers.