Getty James Harden #13 of the Houston Rockets
The Houston Rockets have sniffed the Larry O’Brien Trophy many times over recent years. Unfortunately for James Harden and his fellow Houstonians, they’ve repeatedly fallen just short.
Over the past five seasons, the Rockets have reached at least the Conference Semifinals on four occasions, while booking tickets to the Conference Finals twice over that span.
While impressive, Harden and his fellow teammates are looking for more, namely an NBA Title. On the heels of the team’s first regular-season game since early-March, Harden sounds primed to deliver.
Just take a look at his interaction with reporters on Thursday when asked if he had a message for the fans of Houston.
We’re bringing it back to H-Town. We’ve come up short these last few years, but this is another opportunity for us to fight for it, to get after it again. We got some grinding to do, some work to do. But the goal is to bring it back to H-Town.
On the eve of Houston’s opener, James Harden has this message for #Rockets fans back home:
“We bringing it back to H-Town. We’ve come up short these last few years, but this is another opportunity for us to fight for it, and get after it again.” #OneMission
Was it an official NBA Title guarantee Harden made in the clip shared above, via USA Today’s Ben DuBose? Maybe not, but it was damn close.
The 8x-All-Star made it clear it’s title or bust for his Rockets this season. Good news for Houston fans, the way Harden’s been performing this season, bringing a championship home to H-Town is certainly not out of the realm of possibility.
Harden Has Been Unreal This Season
The Rockets will have a tall task to live up to Harden’s lofty expectations, a task that just got a bit harder following the injury to his fellow backcourt-mate, Eric Gordon.
Houston currently sits tied for fifth in the Western Conference standings, alongside Harden’s former team, the Oklahoma City Thunder. With that said, their No. 2 ranked scoring offense in the NBA gives them a fighting chance night in and night out. An offense led by one of the greatest scorers in league history, ala Harden.
Currently riding back-to-back scoring championships, and well on his way to his third, Harden has taken his already MVP caliber play to new heights this season.
Aside from once again leading all players in scoring for the 2019-20 season, the Rockets star ranks first in essentially every statistic related to putting the ball in the bucket. No player in the NBA has more total points, field goals made, field goals attempted, 3-PT field goals made, 3-PT field goals attempted, FT-Made, FT-attempted, nor points off of turnover than Harden has this season.
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James Harden is ‘One of the Greatest Scorers of All Time’
Back in December, Harden became the first player in NBA history to record back-to-back 50-point games with more than 10 three-pointers. However, ESPN’s Kendrick Perkins believes that may just be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the 2018 league MVP.
“James Harden is a Killer. James Harden is arguably, he could be in the conversation as arguably one of the greatest scorers of all time,” Perkins proclaimed during a recent debate on First Take. “We’re talking about a guy that has four 50-point triple-doubles, one 60-point triple-double.”
Perkins took things a step further stating there’s “nothing that James Harden can’t do. And I don’t say this about a lot of people, but James Harden could go out and get an easy 60. How can you say that? Drop an easy 60 ball on somebody.”
Perkins doubled down on his comments following the segment, responding to his original clip on Twitter, as shown below, and it’s hard not to see why with the way league’s top scorer has been playing.
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Did James Harden Just Guarantee a Rockets NBA Title? [WATCH]