The Philadelphia 76ers’ game against the Denver Nuggets will be played Saturday as scheduled, sources told ESPN, after several Sixers players were part of the contact tracing.
The 76ers are expected to have nine players eligible for the duel, including Joel Embiid, Danny Green and Paul Reed, sources added to ESPN.
The approval of the health and safety protocol does not guarantee that Embiid will play on Saturday, only that he counts as an eligible player for the eight needed for Philadelphia to avoid postponement.
Several Sixers, including Tobias Harris, Matisse Thybulle, Shake Milton and Vincent Poirier, remain on health and safety protocols and will continue in quarantine indefinitely.
Saturday afternoon’s game had a chance to be the second postponement of the NBA season’s coronavirus-related game, due to the shared closeness of some 76ers players to protect Seth Curry, who tested positive for COVID -19.
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The Sixers also had a staff member who tested positive Friday, a source told ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne.
Denver has its own COVID-19 problems. The Nuggets flew to Philadelphia on Friday without the talented young winger Michael Porter Jr., who remains on the sidelines of health and safety protocols indefinitely.