Myers, 76ers looking for collaborative approach from next GM to help Philadelphia win a championship

CAMDEN, N.J. (AP) — In their next general manager, the Philadelphia 76ers are looking for someone who will take a collaborative approach and help them win a championship.

The 76ers fired Daryl Morey on Tuesday after six seasons in which he made the playoffs five times but never got past the second round. This season, Philadelphia was swept by the New York Knicks.

“This is a blue-blood organization,” Bob Myers, who is overseeing the GM search, said Thursday at a news conference. “We’re committed to winning.”

Myers, who helped guide the Golden State Warriors to four championships as general manager, joined the 76ers organization in October. He said he expects the next Philadelphia GM to work with others to come to the best decisions.

“You need good people that are in harmony,” he said.

Morey had a winning record but got stuck in the second round, going 270-212 in the regular season and 28-26 in the playoffs. The former Philadelphia general manager received criticism for trading away Jared McCain, who has prospered in Oklahoma City since the February move.

Managing partner Josh Harris said the organization gave the green light for the move, which yielded the 76ers draft picks.

“It was part of a bigger plan,” Harris said. “We don’t know the outcome of the trade right now.”

Harris expressed his disappointment to fans with how the 76ers finished this year.

“No one is more frustrated than me that we have not achieved our goals,” he said. “We owe it to you and the city to be better.”

In Myers, Harris believes they have an executive who will be able to identify the ideal candidate to succeed Morey.

“He’s universally respected across the sports industry,” Harris said.

Myers said he hopes to hire a GM before the NBA draft, which begins June 23, but said he would not rush the process.

“I’m a big believer in character and leadership,” he said. “I’m looking for a person who embodies those things.”

Whoever he hires will need to be focused on winning a title, which he admitted is not easy.

“It takes a great level of uncomfortability to win a championship,” Myers said. “Nobody plays this game to make the playoffs. I also want to say how hard it actually is. There is no wave of wand. This requires a ton of work.”

During the interview process, Myers will gauge candidates’ opinion of Philadelphia’s roster and whether they can win as currently constructed.

“We have to look at what happened this year and be honest about it,” Myers said. “Can this model work?”

The 76ers are built around high-priced veterans Joel Embiid and Paul George, as well as promising young players Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgecombe. Embiid’s availability, due to a variety of injuries, has been a consistent issue for the 76ers. George was suspended for 25 games this season for violating the league’s drug program.

“The truth is depth may be more important than it’s ever been,” Myers said.

While Philadelphia will be searching for a new general manager, Harris reiterated the organization’s commitment to head coach Nick Nurse.

“The team played hard for Nick,” Harris said. “He’s earned the right to be here. He’s our coach moving forward into next season.”

Harris also addressed the club’s willingness to exceed the league’s luxury tax, something that was questioned following the McCain trade.

“The front office absolutely has the green light to go into the luxury tax,” he said. “It’s not an issue.”

He also expressed his dismay at Knicks fans taking over the 76ers’ home arena in Games 3 and 4 of the second-round series in Philadelphia.

“Obviously, I didn’t like it,” Harris said. “It’s our home court. Our job is to come back and win that series next year.”

Philadelphia hopes the next GM can get them over that hump — with a little help from others in the organization.

“It’s not one person that wins championships,” Myers said. “It’s a team of people.”

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FILE - Philadelphia 76ers President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey speaks after an NBA basketball game, April 13, 2025, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)

Philadelphia 76ers Managing Partner Josh Harris, left, and Bob Myers, President of Sports for Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, take part in a news conference at the NBA basketball team's practice facility in Camden, N.J., Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Philadelphia 76ers Managing Partner Josh Harris speaks with members of the media during a news conference at the NBA basketball team's practice facility in Camden, N.J., Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Bob Myers, President of Sports for Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, speaks with members of the media during a news conference at the Philadelphia 76ers NBA basketball team's practice facility in Camden, N.J., Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

Philadelphia 76ers Managing Partner Josh Harris, left, and Bob Myers, President of Sports for Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, take part in a news conference at the NBA basketball team's practice facility in Camden, N.J., Thursday, May 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday preserved women’s access to a drug used in the most common method of abortion, rejecting lower-court restrictions while a lawsuit continues.

The court’s order allows women seeking abortions to continue obtaining the drug, mifepristone, at pharmacies or through the mail, without an in-person visit to a doctor. Access is likely to remain uninterrupted at least until into next year as the case plays out, including a potential appeal to the high court.

The justices granted emergency requests from makers of mifepristone, who are appealing a federal appeals court ruling that would require women to see a doctor in person and halt delivery of mifepristone through the mail. The federal Food and Drug Administration, which first approved mifepristone for use in abortion in 2000, stopped requiring in-person visits five years ago.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented, with Thomas writing that the two companies, Danco Laboratories and GenBioPro, are not entitled to the court's action to spare them “lost profits from their criminal enterprise.”

Anti-abortion groups, frustrated with President Donald Trump’s administration, are pushing the FDA to move faster with a review that they hope will result in restrictions on mifepristone, including blocking its prescribing via telehealth platforms. The Republican administration says the work takes time.

Earlier this week, FDA Commissioner Marty Makary resigned after months of criticism from Trump’s political allies, including abortion opponents.

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America and similarly aligned groups had called on Trump to fire Makary over the slow pace of the mifepristone review.

The court is dealing with its latest abortion controversy four years after its conservative majority overturned Roe v. Wade and allowed more than a dozen states to effectively ban abortion outright.

The case before the court stems from a lawsuit Louisiana filed to roll back the Food and Drug Administration’s rules on how mifepristone can be prescribed. The state claims that the policy undermines the ban there, and it questions the safety of the drug, which has repeatedly been deemed safe and effective by FDA scientists.

Alito, who wrote the opinion overturning Roe, agreed that the state's efforts have been thwarted by medical providers and private organizations that mail the pills to women in Louisiana, despite the abortion ban. Danco and GenBioPro “are obviously aware of what is going on yet nevertheless supply the drug and reap profits from its felonious use in Louisiana,” he wrote.

Thomas said those who mail the pills are in violation of the Comstock Act, a 19th-century law that has long gone unenforced and bans mailing any “article, instrument, substance, drug, medicine, or thing which is advertised or described in a manner calculated to lead another to use or apply it for producing abortion.”

Lower courts concluded that Louisiana is likely to prevail, and a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that mail access and telehealth visits should be suspended while the case plays out.

The drug is most often used for abortion in combination with another drug, misoprostol. Medication abortions accounted for nearly two-thirds of all abortions in the U.S. in 2023, the last year for which statistics are available.

Telehealth prescribers were prepared to switch to sending abortion patients a regimen that uses only misoprostol.

While Thursday’s ruling keeps the status quo in place for now, abortion-rights advocates warn that the case isn’t settled forever.

“We are relieved that access to mifepristone remains protected for now, but this should never have been on the table in the first place,” Serra Sippel, executive director of The Brigid Alliance, which helps coordinate and fund travel and other logistics to assist women traveling for abortion, said in a statement. “Patients and providers should not be forced to wait on court rulings to know whether people can access critical health care.”

The decision is “extremely disappointing” but not a defeat, said Gavin Oxley, a spokesperson for the anti-abortion advocacy group Americans United for Life. “The Supreme Court still has the opportunity to hear the case in full and bring justice to Louisiana,” he said.

The current dispute is similar to one that reached the court three years ago, when the justices blocked a 5th Circuit ruling in a suit filed by anti-abortion doctors and kept mifepristone widely available, over dissents from Alito and Thomas.

Then, in 2024, the high court unanimously dismissed the doctors’ suit, reasoning they did not have the legal right, or standing, to sue.

In the current dispute, mainstream medical groups, the pharmaceutical industry and Democratic members of Congress have weighed in cautioning the court against limiting access to the drug. Pharmaceutical companies said a ruling for abortion opponents would upend the drug approval process.

Debate over the safety of mifepristone has churned for more than 25 years. The FDA has eased a number of restrictions initially placed on the drug, including who can prescribe it, how it is dispensed and what kinds of safety complications must be reported.

Despite those determinations, anti-abortion groups have filed a series of petitions and lawsuits against the agency, generally alleging that it violated federal law by overlooking safety issues with the pill.

Trump’s administration has been unusually quiet at the Supreme Court. It declined to file a written brief recommending what the court should do, even though federal regulations are at issue.

The case puts the administration in a difficult place. Trump has relied on the political support of anti-abortion groups but has also seen ballot question and poll results that show Americans generally support abortion rights.

Both sides took the administration’s silence as an implicit endorsement of the appellate ruling.

Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this report from New York. Mulvihill reported from Haddonfield, N.J.

Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

FILE - Boxes of the drug mifepristone sit on a shelf at the West Alabama Women's Center in Tuscaloosa, Ala., March 16, 2022. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed, File)