HARDEN HELD IN CHECK, BUT RAPS LOSE
Rockets teammates pick up slack with efficient shooting
The Toronto Raptors managed to hold NBA scoring leader James Harden mostly in check on Thursday night, but Harden’s teammates stepped up in a major way, allowing Houston to exit with a victory.
Ben Mclemore hit a careerbest eight three-pointers, P.J. Tucker added five and the Rockets nailed 22 treys in all in the 119-109 win.
The Raptors were all over Harden right from the start, sending two players aggressively at him on every touch and it completely threw the Rockets off. Houston had six early turnovers. But the Rockets were on fire from deep, nailing seven of 15 three-pointers in the first quarter to take the lead. When Toronto cooled from outside, the Rockets pulled away, building a lead as large as 16 points. It wasn’t the all-stars Harden or Russell Westbrook doing the damage, though (Westbrook had a triple-double, but had a terrible shooting night and turned over the ball excessively). It was former Raptor Tucker and guards Danuel House and Mclemore raining three-pointers. The trio had 10 treys in the first half alone as Houston went up 63-55.
Toronto expended all kinds of energy in swarming Harden while also trying to get back to defend the three-point line and there were periods where Houston went on big runs. Toronto held opponents to 33.2 per cent shooting on three-pointers going into the game, No. 2 in the NBA, but the Rockets nailed 40 per cent of their attempts. The 55 three-point shots by the visitors was just one shy of the NBA high for this season set by Brooklyn.
Harden finished with 23 points, largely thanks to 11 in the third quarter before he briefly left after suffering a head injury. Mclemore had 29, Tucker 18. Westbrook had 19, along with 13 rebounds and 11 assists, but shot just 7-for27. The positives for Toronto were the bounce-back games turned in by stars Pascal Siakam (24 points) and Kyle Lowry (19, along with eight assists).
Siakam followed his season-low 10-point performance versus Orlando with 35 against Utah Sunday. He had only 15 Tuesday in the overtime loss against Miami, Toronto’s first home loss of the season, and responded with 14 in the first quarter alone. Serge Ibaka and Norman Powell both hit double digits in scoring off the bench.
The league has been trying to figure out how to contain Harden and Toronto tried an interesting approach and found some success at times with it, but not so much at others.
Tucker is particularly deadly from the corners (he leads all players in makes and attempts from there and shoots better than 55 per cent) and he was once again in this one. Mclemore’s performance was the outlier, but he had a similar effort last week.
Houston led 94-88 after three and Toronto threatened a few times from there, but couldn’t come all the way back.
SCORING BONANZA
Harden’s led the NBA in scoring in each of the last two seasons, but the 30.4 points he averaged in 2017-18 seem quaint when you think about how many more points are being scored these days leaguewide. It was a big deal when Harden shot up to 36.1 per game in 2018-19, but he entered Thursday’s game averaging 39.5 in 37.4 minutes per game. Only Wilt Chamberlain has averaged more. The Big
Dipper averaged 50.4 points in 1961-62 and 44.8 the next year.
If he can keep this up, Harden would join only Chamberlain and Michael Jordan as players who have averaged at least 37 points in a season. Harden’s already one of only five players to have averaged more than 35 points per game in a season.
Harden had averaged 28.7 points per game in 18 meetings with the Raptors. Only Allen Iverson (29.7) has averaged more in the 25-year history of the franchise. Steph Curry was 0.1 behind Harden. Harden had scored 110 points over his previous two games, becoming just the third player to follow a 60-point outing with a 50-point one and he was trying to join Kobe Bryant and Jordan as the only players with three 50-point games in a row since 1983.
He didn’t get there thanks to Toronto’s defensive approach and, for once, Houston’s supporting cast got to do the heavy lifting and it answered the call.