Doc Rivers Expresses Confidence In James Harden Before Playoffs

PHILADELPHIA–With the Philadelphia 76ers now turning their attention to the playoffs, there are a few questions surrounding them before this postseason run.

One of them is the health of James Harden. The Sixers want to be sure that he is in tip-top shape in order to produce in the postseason and when considering that he has been dealing with a sore left Achilles, the question is whether he will be ready for a deep playoff run or not.

Harden had some tough shooting performances down the stretch. Notably a 2-for-14 showing on March 20 and a 4-for-14 performance on March 29. He also had a poor showing in the loss to the Milwaukee Bucks on April 2 when he had five turnovers compared to four made field goals.

With that being said, Harden did have an overall terrific season as he led the league in assists at 10.7 while averaging 21 points on 38.5% from deep. Those are all-NBA numbers.

“He’s done everything we’ve asked him to do,” said Rivers. “His assists are a career-high, as high as he’s ever been, 3-point field goal percentage. There’s a lot of people out there who thought that he would never do some of the things that he’s doing. Not as far as scoring, he can still do that, but as far as giving up scoring to run the team, and he’s doing that. He’s been great at it and I couldn’t be happier.”

In terms of missing any open looks, Rivers isn’t concerned with that. While he didn’t have his greatest performances down the stretch of the season, just because he missed some shots isn’t a cause for concern.

“If you get them, you take them,” he added. “I think over the season we make most of them. We make our share and we’re going to have some games where we don’t.”

If there is one concern Rivers has with the Sixers, it is that sometimes they lost their pace and that is when Harden and Joel Embiid have to save them.

“I still think at times our tempo, we get stuck,” Rivers finished. “We get stagnant. The ball sticks and that’s what we can’t do. We got to play with movement and pace. When we get away from that, then we need Joel’s greatness or James or someone to bail us out and that’s just not good enough.”

Either way, the Sixers seem to be in a very good position as they move forward with their championship quest. Harden and Embiid will look to lead the way to the mountaintop.