Sixers Need More From Simmons and Embiid Starting Tonight

The Sixers play the first of 72 regular season games tonight against the Washington Wizards.

After a disappointing 42-30 record and first-round playoff exit, the team has a new look on the sideline, the front office and on the floor.

Doc Rivers is now on the sideline, Daryl Morey is now building the roster, which is now filled with more outside shooting around their incumbent core of Joel Embiid, Ben Simmons and Tobias Harris.

The team added Seth Curry in a deal with Dallas, bringing in a player who currently has the second-highest 3-point percentage in NBA history. He should give the Sixers more spacing on the floor that they seriously lacked last season.  The team also brought in two-time NBA champion, Danny Green. Green not only can shoot the three, but is a strong wing defender, something the team lacked last season on the perimeter.

So will the presence of Rivers, Morey, Green and Curry be enough to get the Sixers deeper into the playoffs in 2020-21?

"Out goal is to win a championship," Embiid said on Tuesday. "We've all worked hard to do so.  It's got to start from the first game."

The team went through multiple years of losing to obtain Embiid and Simmons, and now both players are hitting their prime, which means, the clock is ticking for this duo to bring home a title to Philadelphia for the first-time since the 1983 season.

"We have Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid on our basketball team," explained Rivers.  Right now teams that have two NBA all-stars and all-defensive players tend to fair well, making us special in that regard."

But that duo has struggled to consistently mesh well together on the floor. It is well documented that Simmons, a tremendous player, has his limitations on the offensive end of the floor.  His reluctance to shoot the ball as some wondering if Morey would pull the trigger on a deal for James Harden, his former star in Houston.

Both Morey and Rivers have stated they has no interest in moving on from Simmons, but many times in this league, where there is smoke there is fire.

"My mentality never changes," Simmons said. "I'm here to win a championship. That goal is never going to change.  I know things will be said in the media, rumors, but my goal is to help the team I am on win a championship."

To win that championship, the Sixers will need more from Simmons and Embiid.  We're about to find out if they have more to give - starting tonight.