James Harden’s confoundingly poor performance in the Houston Rockets NBA elimination loss to San Antonio last week isn’t without precedence. I sat courtside at American Airlines Arena in Miami when Arizona State lost 78-67 in a second-round NCAA Tournament game to Syracuse in 2009.
Harden, the Pac-10 Player of the Year, didn’t appear to be engaged in the game. He did not score in the first half and finished with 2-for-10 shooting and 10 points. That’s almost exactly what he did — 2-for-11 with 11 points — last week against the Spurs.
Two hours after Harden’s ineffective performance in Miami, 12th-seeded Arizona qualified for the Sweet 16 by beating Cleveland State.
