It is unreasonable to expect an athlete to maintain peak excellence, yet for two games in the NBA semi-final Western Conference finals, against the best defensive team in the league, James Harden did it.
He expertly walked a tightrope of difficult step-back jumpers, contested long-range shots and devil-may-care drives to the rim. In Game 3 of Houston’s series with Golden State, it finally came undone.
Whether from fatigue, imprecision or bad luck, everything that worked in Games 1 and 2 failed him on Saturday night in a 3-for-16 shooting collapse.
Still, let’s appreciate Harden for what he managed in those first two contests, when he was “on” and the Rockets lost by an aggregate five points. On Saturday, when his teammates played largely at their usual levels but he was “off”, they lost by 35.
The MVP runner-up averaged 33 points, nine assists and 10.5 rebounds in the first two games. It was masterful.
Harden was all-encompassing in his creativity, crafting open shots for others and knifing through openings for his own. He drilled Golden State even when they were focused on him and he wasn’t open.
With Houston almost certainly no longer long for these play-offs (no NBA team has overcome a 3-0 play-offs deficit), it is worth noting all the same that going blow-for-blow, even for a brief moment, with the juggernaut 2014/15 Warriors will be a remembered feat.
Harden has taken heat for, among other things, cynically drawing fouls and not often seeming to care on defence. But when he is going, it is beautiful to watch. No other player has as impeccable a sense of timing or mastering of movement to dance defenders out of their shoes quite like Harden.
Few other players have as convincing a quiet assuredness.
If the Houston Rockets weren’t good enough, quite, to win an NBA title this year, I would argue that at least James Harden was.
jraymond@thenational.ae
Follow us on Twitter @NatSportUAE
