Sources – Philadelphia 76ers star Joel Embiid has a knee bruise, can miss 2 weeks

Philadelphia 76ers star Joel Embiid has a bruise on his left knee and could be missing for two weeks, sources told ESPN.

An MRI at night revealed no structural damage to the knee that hyperextended Embiid in a victory over the Washington Wizards on Friday night, sources said. Embiid underwent the MRI immediately after returning to Philadelphia late Friday night, sources said.

Embiid’s ACL and meniscus are fine, sources said, and there is considerable relief among the Sixers that the injury isn’t much worse.

Embiid left Friday night’s game when he hyperextended his left knee after landing with all his weight on his leg after a dunk in the third quarter.

Embiid was in the middle of the last dominant performance of his MVP caliber season, scoring 23 points on 8-for-11 shooting to go along with 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 blocks in 20 minutes when he caught a pass from Tobias. Harris and flew in for a dunk to give Philadelphia an 80-60 lead with 6 minutes, 20 seconds to go in the third quarter.

But when Embiid went down after the dunk, his full body weight landed on that left leg – hyperextending it, causing him to fall to court and hurt him.

After staying downstairs for a few minutes, Embiid finally got to his feet and walked away on his own – albeit with a rather pronounced limp – as he immediately went back to the visitors’ locker room in Washington’s Capital One Arena.

Embiid had a similarly terrifying situation last month when he hyperextended his right knee in an uncomfortable fall against the Portland Trail Blazers after blocking an Enes Kanter lay-up. In that match, Embiid returned a few minutes later and dominated, scoring 31 points in the first half in a matchup that Philadelphia eventually lost.

The Sixers had just gotten Embiid back on Friday night after both he and Ben Simmons missed Thursday’s victory in Chicago over the Bulls – as well as Sunday’s All-Star Game in Atlanta – for tracking down contacts of a hairdresser who visited both stars before going on left. to Atlanta.

ESPN’s Tim Bontemps contributed to this report.