Awesome to the Maxey | Sports Daily Newsletter

Mondays don’t quite feel the same when there’s no Eagles game to dissect — and this is the first of two consecutive weeks where that will be the case. But at least next Monday there will be a prime-time Super Bowl rematch to look forward to that night.

The good news is that Eagles void has left plenty of space in the area of our brain that craves sports for the red-hot Sixers, who improved to 8-1 on the season Sunday night. And it wasn’t just that they beat the Indiana Pacers; it was that Tyrese Maxey dropped a career-best 50 points on just 20 shots, while Joel Embiid added 37 points of his own.

Those 87 combined points are the most ever in a game by a pair of Sixers teammates — they passed Allen Iverson and Chris Webber, who totaled 81 in March 2006 — and they put Embiid and Maxey in a four-way tie for the seventh most in NBA history. Maxey also joined the likes of Embiid, Iverson, Wilt Chamberlain, and Moses Malone as one of 10 Sixers players to hit the half-century mark.

Following the game, Maxey dedicated his performance to injured teammate Kelly Oubre Jr., who was struck by a car Saturday night in Center City.

“This had nothing to do with me,” Maxey said on the broadcast after the win. “This is all Kelly Oubre. We’re praying for him. [I] love my dawg. I just met him, but I love him. I hope he gets well soon.”

The good news — aside from Maxey’s development taking yet another massive step — is that Oubre appears to have avoided any career- or even season-threatening injuries. We’ve got plenty on his prognosis and how the Sixers will look to replace him, the latest on the Birds as they come out of the bye, and much more.

— Matt Mullin, @phillysport, sports.daily@inquirer.com.

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❓Tyrese Maxey is only 23 years old. Will he wind up having a better career than Joel Embiid? Email us back for a chance to be featured in the newsletter.

In their first three games, the Eagles averaged 4.9 yards per carry and 185.7 yards per game. In their next six? They averaged 3.4 yards per carry and 101.7 yards per game.

“The Eagles have become a trick-play, shovel-pass, jet-sweep team because they can’t run the ball,” writes columnist Marcus Hayes. And the reasons for those struggles are “obvious,” according to one offensive lineman.

The Eagles climbed to the NFL’s best record through the first nine games of the season. Throughout the bye week, coach Nick Sirianni and his staff will attempt to execute their best self-assessment as they prepare for the second half of the season.

Here are three areas that the team should prioritize — aside from their ground attack — during their self-scout period.

Next: The Eagles don’t play again until next Monday night when they face the Kansas City Chiefs in a Super Bowl rematch.

Before Maxey’s career night, the bigger story for the Sixers was Kelly Oubre Jr. being struck by a car in a Center City hit-and-run that left him with a broken rib, a hip injury, and other cuts and bruises.

Oubre is expected to miss significant time, but the injuries are not considered season-ending or career-threatening. And after Oubre, who has been playing some of the best basketball of his career, was released from the hospital, his teammates and coach are just relieved it wasn’t any worse.

“Our emphasis is to make sure he’s good,” Tobias Harris said. “That’s our brother. That’s our teammate. ... Everybody’s relieved that it wasn’t anything worse than that.”

Now, knowing Oubre will be back from his injuries, the team can focus on how they get by until he’s ready to return. And in the longterm, it may actually make them a more resilient group.

Next: The Sixers host the Pacers again on Tuesday — this time as part of the NBA In-Season Tournament (7:30 p.m., NBCSP).

Former Flyers goaltender Roman Čechmánek passed away on Sunday at 52 years old.

Čechmánek, a native of Czechia, played three years for the Flyers (2000-03), was named an NHL All-Star in 2001 and was twice named the team’s Bobby Clarke Trophy winner as team MVP. In three years with the Flyers he posted a .923 save percentage over 163 games.

Next: The Flyers are back in action Wednesday against the Carolina Hurricanes (7:30 p.m., TNT).

Family and friends of former Temple football player Jarred Alwan recently gathered to celebrate what would have been his 30th birthday. Alwan died by suicide, but after sending his brain to be studied by Boston University’s Brain Bank, the family learned that he was suffering from Stage II CTE, the same form of the disease former NFL star Junior Seau had when he took his own life in 2012.

“I just want them to change the words from suicide,” his mother Narci Alwan told The Inquirer of how her son died. “Because how is it suicide when you don’t know what you’re doing? I want to change the death certificate. He had no idea.”

She’s also thinking of looking into taking legal action.

Nov. 13, 1979: Sixers big man Darryl Dawkins, better known as “Chocolate Thunder,” shattered the backboard in a road loss to the Kansas City Kings. Three weeks later, during a win in front of a home crowd, Dawkins did it again.

Kenny Gainwell has a routine. Check the phone at halftime, send a text to his parents or girlfriend, get ready for the second half. But during the Philadelphia Eagles’ October 29th, 2023 game at Washington, he made the mistake of engaging with a frustrated fan who sent him a direct message. After the game, a screenshot of the exchange went public, and Gainwell and the Eagles had a mess on their hands.

The incident, however, revived a conversation in sports that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere any time soon: is social media good for professional athletes? Is it worth it? What are the rewards and traps? Jeff McLane posed these questions to the Eagles’ locker room, with over a dozen players sharing personal stories about social media use, and how it’s affected them and their mental health. Listen here.

We compiled today’s newsletter using reporting from Gina Mizell, Keith Pompey, Marcus Hayes, Josh Tolentino, Jackie Spiegel, Mike Jensen, Jeff Neiburg, Seth Engle, Jeff McLane, and Chris Williams.

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