EMPTY FEELING
Harden’s inability to carry Rockets across finish line remains his burden
In the Rockets’ final huddle before entering the arena, James Harden implored his teammates to take advantage of this opportunity, to be aggressive from the opening tip.
It was minutes prior to Game 7 against the defending NBA champion Golden State Warriors.
Harden has always wanted this moment. This opportunity. This drama.
He believes he is built for this. The Rockets believe he has this in him.
These bright shining moments, when star power often carries the day, can be, should be, his.
But a couple hours later, the lights were dim on the Toyota Center loading dock, when Harden slowly exited the building, and headed into the Houston night for the final time this season.
Defeated and deflated — the Warriors won the game 101-92 to advance to the NBA Finals — but still determined.
Monday was one of those frustrating nights when Harden shouldn’t shoulder the blame for the Rockets coming up short, but the damsel in distress was there to be saved and he failed to do so.
The Beard didn’t seize the superhero opportunity.
Outshined by Warriors duo
Harden played a solid game, finishing with a team-high 32 points, while grabbing six rebounds and dishing out six assists. And he was superb defensively, hustling to stay in position and picking up four steals.
But he wasn’t better than Kevin Durant. And he wasn’t better than Steph Curry.
He wasn’t his best on a night that he needed to be. So, for the 23rd straight season, the Rockets will watch the NBA Finals on television.
Harden’s talent and drive have lifted the Rockets to numerous victories throughout their record-setting season, but getting them to four wins over the Warriors would have lifted the franchise and his reputation to a special place.
As the game started to slip away from the Rockets in the third quarter, when an 11-point halftime lead turned into a seven-point deficit, Harden tried to get the Rockets going.
“Come on, let’s go,” Harden told his teammates. “Let’s go, it’s time.”
“But we didn’t have that extra juice that we needed,” he would say afterward. “I don’t know what it was.”
To be great, that is what Harden has to figure out.
How do you lift a team in the pressure moments? How do you make your teammates play better than they are? When do you forget them and do it yourself ?
Those aren’t easy questions to answer.
I have no doubt Harden will figure it out, but the standard criticism at this level is until you do it, you can’t. Until you have done it, you won’t.
Harden, who turns 29 this summer, just finished his ninth season. Hakeem Olajuwon was 31 and in his 10th season when he won his first MVP and led the Rockets to their first championship.
We wouldn’t be having this discussion if the Rockets had made a few more shots Monday night.
NBA Game 7s present all of the drama one can have in a playoff series.
It is do or die, playoff life or death.
Even as much as the Rockets have evolved from a team that lives and dies by the 3-pointer, there are limits to that progress.
The Rockets tested said limits in the worst possible way, with what is statistically the worst shooting stretch in NBA playoff history.
They made just seven of 44 3-points attempts, which, according to basketball-reference.com, is the worst in any game in team history. It was amazing. Never before has such a suicide been committed in an NBA playoff game.
The previous record for the fewest 3-pointers made by team that attempted more than 40 treys in a playoff game was nine.
Just another brick in the fall
Harden (2-of-13), Eric Gordon (2-of-12) and the brickmaster Trevor Ariza (0-for-9) went a combined 4-for-34 from long range, and all participated in an astonishing 0-for-27 stretch of 3-point misfires.
The Elias Sports Bureau says it was the worst stretch of consecutive misses of 3-pointers in playoff history.
That the rim survived those clanks could be evidence that vibranium exists.
Amazingly, the Rockets were within six points with five minutes to play, despite the horrible shooting.
But Harden and the Rockets didn’t have it down the stretch.
The Warriors were too good, the Rockets too bad, Harden not quite the superhero he needed to be.
“The way they play, with James running so many screenand-rolls, that’s exhausting … it’s tiring” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said. “So he had a big burden on his shoulders.”
Burden indeed. That’s life at the top.
Most of the greats have been questioned. All of the very good have been questioned. For now, Harden is very good. And very good isn’t good enough to beat the Warriors.