Getty James Harden of the Philadelphia 76ers
Since Christmas Day 2022, Philadelphia 76ers star James Harden has been linked to his former team, the Houston Rockets. Jake Fischer of Yahoo Sports added a new wrinkle to Harden’s potential reunion with the Rockets – the potential divorce between Nick Nurse and the Toronto Raptors, which could pave the way for him and Harden to pair up in Houston.
“Harden has loomed as a key target for the Rockets, sources told Yahoo Sports, with an opportunity to decline his player option with the Philadelphia 76ers for the 2023-24 campaign. And several potential coaching candidates — in addition to (Nick) Nurse — whom league personnel have connected to the Rockets have a shared history with Harden,” Fischer reported.
Fischer added that Raptors officials “have been openly evaluating Nurse’s current fit at the position after leading Toronto to its only championship in 2019.”
If Nurse leaves Toronto for Houston this summer, that could potentially strengthen the Rockets’ campaign to bring him back, seeing how Nurse coached the Raptors when they won the NBA Championship in 2019.
Nick Nurse Sounds Off on James Harden and Joel Embiid Duo
After the Sixers beat the Raptors on March 31, Nurse praised the duo of Harden and Joel Embiid in an interview with Ky Carlin of USA Today’s Sixers Wire for how well they’ve done in their first full season together.
“I think that it just seems to have just solidified much more,” Nurse told Carlin. “I just think that certainly the combinations, numbers-wise, and just trying to figure out how to guard it and stuff is difficult when you’re an opposing coach, but it just seems like they’re just, I mean, that’s the word. They’re playing more solid.”
Nurse singled out their consistency as a duo as a reason for why he believes they’ve progressed as a pair.
“I think they know what, really, each one of them is going to do, and they just kind of do very similar output a lot of nights, so there’s a consistency there,” Nurse said. “So I think it just didn’t seem as solidified last year, but it does now.”
Nurse also talked about the various actions the two of them can run together that can make them so dangerous as a pair.
“You got to worry about (Embiid) running you over and laying it in, you got to worry about him early post-up, you got to worry about each block on the post-up, you got to worry about him steamrolling down the lane on the pick-and-roll with Harden,” Nurse finished on Embiid. “Now he’s got this too and then also pick-and-pop for 3s, but the great players have all that stuff, and their coaches are smart enough to put them in all those actions.”
Some Sixers Brass ‘Would Not Mind’ if James Harden Left
An Eastern Conference executive revealed to Heavy Sports’ Sean Deveney that there are some in the Sixers’ front office that wouldn’t be too down if Harden left the Sixers this summer.
“There are some in that organization who would not mind at all if Harden left,” the GM told Deveney. “I don’t think he will, but he could, and even if he doesn’t, he is not going to get a real long deal from the Sixers. He is getting older, you don’t know how much of a commitment you want to make him.”
How much the Sixers will pay and for how long could factor into whether Harden decides to stay or not.