James Harden had a tough time against the Warriors during the regular season. While his averages of 21.8 points, 11.3 assists and 11.0 rebounds per game look good on the surface, he got them shooting 31.5 percent from the field and 14.7 percent from the 3-point line. Throw 39 free throws attempts into the equation and Harden’s true shooting percentage against the Warriors (48.2 percent) is similar to Emmanuel Mudiay’s (48.3 percent) and Ish Smith’s (47.7 percent) on the season, both of whom struggle to space the floor with any sort of regularity. It doesn’t help that he also turned the ball over slightly more than usual with 6.3 turnovers per game.
Since the Rockets will likely have to go through the Warriors to make it out of the Western Conference, it’s worth looking at how the Warriors have had success slowing down Harden. It doesn’t simply boil down to the Warriors having the second best defense in the NBA because Harden dominated the Spurs, Jazz, Hawks and Heat — the four other teams in the top-five in defensive efficiency — during the regular season. Instead, it has to do with the Warriors having the ideal personnel to match up with him.
To contain Harden, teams have to be able to stick with him in the pick-and-roll and in isolation. 40.5 percent of his offense on the season came in the pick-and-roll and he ranked in the 91.5 percentile with 1.02 points per possession. Another 24.2 percent came in isolation, where he ranked in the 76.3 percentile with 0.98 points per possession. Kemba Walker scores as many points per game as him out of the pick-and-roll, but Harden leads the league with 6.8 isolation points per game.
Read More: This funky pick-and-roll shows how smart the Warriors are
Seeing as those two plays almost made up two-thirds of his scoring on the season, making him uncomfortable in the pick-and-roll and isolation gives teams a good chance at slowing down the NBA’s second-best offense.
*****
Let’s look at how the Warriors defend Harden in isolation first.
The Warriors know everything runs through Harden, so they try to make his life as difficult as possible whenever the Rockets are in scoring position. For example, the Rockets sometimes have Harden act as the screener for Patrick Beverley in the pick-and-roll in an attempt to get Stephen Curry switched onto him so he can attack a smaller defender in isolation. Both Curry and Klay Thompson do a good job of sticking with their assignments in those scenarios to avoid switching.
Thompson will even extend himself beyond the 3-point line when Harden doesn’t have the ball in his hands to prevent him from getting open looks and to give himself more room to get back in front of Harden when hunts for the switch. But if Harden does get the switch he is looking for, he usually finds himself at the top of the perimeter staring at four held defenders behind Curry, which leaves him no other option than to settle for contested 3s.
If Harden isn’t able to get the ball because of Thompson’s pressure, it forces other players like Eric Gordon to put the ball on the floor and make plays. It’s not as though Gordon can’t create shots for himself and others — he ranks in the 85.2 percentile in isolation scoring on a relatively small sample size — but the Warriors have enough wing defenders to match up with him. Plus, the Warriors will live with Gordon taking contested 3-pointers if it means Harden isn’t the one making plays.
Thompson is just as good when Harden has the ball in his hands as well. Thompson is one of the best on-ball defenders in the NBA and he has the tools to shadow Harden’s every move. Not only is he a disciplined defender — something that matters when trying to keep Harden off the free throw line — he has the length and strength to keep up with Harden off the dribble and contest his shots on step backs and pull-ups.
Here’s another example of Thompson’s ability to matchup with Harden, this time with Thompson blocking his shot at the rim once he quickly recovers from Harden’s signature crossover. Having someone who can stick with him in 1-on-1 situations allows other players to stay home on their assignments and not give up the types of open 3-pointers the Rockets feast on.
Even the shots Harden does hit against Thompson tend to be well contested.
The Warriors also have a one-time member of the All-Defensive First Team on their bench in Andre Iguodala who can harass Harden whenever Thompson needs a breather. Iguodala is cut from the same cloth as Thompson as a strong defender who can absorb Harden’s contact and not fall for some of his tricks. It helps that Iguodala has a 6-foot-11 wingspan to swipe at the ball and contest shots when Harden is able to create some separation.
Then there’s Draymond Green, who plays perhaps the biggest role in Harden’s struggles against the Warriors.
The reason Green is a Defensive Player of the Year candidate is because he is the most versatile defender in the NBA. He contests 7.0 shots per game at the rim on average and allows opponents to shoot only 43.8 percent, according to NBA.com, which is a similar rate to 7-footers like Joel Embiid (41.0 percent), Rudy Gobert (43.3 percent) and Kristaps Porzingis (44.2 percent). On the rare occasions when Harden is able to get past his primary defender, it means he still has to finish over one of the best rim protectors in the league.
Green’s timing in those situations is impeccable. He forces Harden to make a decision at the last second by striking the perfect balance between staying between the ball and his man before creating a wall with his body.
Having Green as the last line of defense allows the rest of the Warriors to overextend themselves when they’re guarding Harden in isolation. As you can see in the video below, James Michael McAdoo presses up on Harden to take away a 3-point attempt. While Harden blows past him, it doesn’t end up hurting the Warriors because Green is in perfect position to protect the basket. It’s why Green thinks of himself almost as an NFL safety, reading the quarterback’s eyes before making a move.
Green is also capable of switching onto Harden and sticking with him in isolation. Those possessions can end in a variety of ways, from Green forcing Harden to take a tougher shot than he’s used to without fouling…
…to forcing live-ball turnovers by moving his feet…
…and recovering quickly when Harden gets a step on him to block his shot at the rim.
That’s what elite defenders do. Thompson and Iguodala make Harden’s life difficult, but it’s Green who puts the nail in the coffin. In the 128 minutes Harden played with Green on the court this season, the Rockets averaged 98.5 points per 100 possessions, which would be the worst offense in the NBA. With Harden on the court and Green off the court, that number rose to 109.1 points per 100 possessions, which put them at the same level as the Spurs.
*****
Now let’s look at how the Warriors defend the pick-and-roll.
Remember how Thompson defended Harden beyond the 3-point line in the first example? There are pros and cons to that method. There’s been a couple of times this season where Harden has taken advantage of the Warriors not being in help position by blowing past Thompson at the 3-point line and coasting to the basket for a dunk.
If they aren’t all on the same page, breakdowns like this…
…and this can easily happen:
The good news for the Warriors is they are a disciplined team. By picking Harden up almost as soon as he crosses halfcourt, it forces him to make quicker decisions. Think about it like this: Harden usually has the room to shoot a 3-pointer off the dribble, pull-up for a mid-range jump shot or drive to the basket for layup when running a pick-and-roll. Against the Warriors, the pull-up 3-point is taken away because someone’s standing at the 3-point line as soon as he comes off of the screen. There’s no room to pull-up from midrange, either, because he’s already going full speed and he has to pick the ball up just inside the perimeter.
That leaves him with the final option of driving for a layup, but he now has to finish over the scariest defender of them all underneath the basket.
Harden makes those shots more often than not, but the point is the Warriors make him uncomfortable. He’s always fighting against some sort of pressure whether it’s Thompson and Iguodala breathing down his neck when he first makes his move, a 7-footer running him off the 3-point line or Green using his length to protect the basket. As Green told Anthony Slater of The Mercury News, their focus is on “forcing him to do what we want him to do” as opposed to letting him “dance.”
One of the ways the Warriors do that is by icing pick-and-rolls, which involves the primary defender forcing the ball handler away from the screen to take away the middle of the floor. The big man then hangs back slightly to contain dribble penetration while preventing a pass to the roller. When done properly, it helps the Warriors contain the pick-and-roll with two defenders. Similar to having one person stick with Harden in isolation, it also allows everyone else to stay on their assignments to prevent open 3-pointers.
However, it doesn’t always work. The margin for error is tiny when trying to defend an elite pick-and-roll scorer like Harden because he can shoot from anywhere and he can navigate his way around screens rather easily. If the big man drops back a step too far, as Zaza Pachulia does in the following clip, he can easily snake his way to the basket for a layup.
Harden can even spot the smallest of gaps and thread the needle when making a pass to the roller. If Green is the one who has to step up on the screen, it pulls their best rim protector away from the paint.
Clint Capela is one of the elite roll men in the NBA. He ranks in the 70.5 percentile with 1.12 points per pick-and-roll possession and only nine players score more points per game than him as the roll man. Even if Green is the one protecting the basket, Capela can finish over him if he’s give the space to gather and explode.
But again, as the Warriors do here:
And here:
Icing the pick-and-roll helps take away scoring opportunities for Harden while limiting his ability to make simple passes out to 3-point shooters and the roller if it’s executed properly. It’s not foolproof — nothing is when defending someone like Harden — but it’s about as good as it’s going to get.
*****
It’s not that Harden is completely useless against the Warriors. Far from it, in fact. He still averaged 11.3 assists per game and the amount of attention he commands opens up plenty of shots for others. The following play is a testament to that. Although he doesn’t get credit for the assist, it’s Harden’s ability to break down his defender and force the defense to collapse that creates the sort of ball movement needed to find open shooters.
There are plenty more examples where that came from. As good as Thompson, Iguodala and Green are defensively, containing Harden requires them to be on a string. It’s hard to pay that much attention to detail for the 38 minutes he is on the floor without giving up some easy looks.
It explains why the Rockets like their odds against the Warriors in a playoff series. Although Harden struggles to get his numbers efficiently, he can still create a high volume of 3-pointers which the Rockets believe they can make at a high enough rate to beat the Warriors. And even if his shots aren’t falling, he’s still going to attack every minute he’s on the floor and force the Warriors to make the tough decision between helping out at the rim and leaving open shooters on the wings.
The problem is those opportunities just don’t come as easily against the Warriors as they do against other teams. They have a number of players who can match up with Harden and they do as good of a job as anyone at disrupting his flow. He’s going to post triple-doubles and play a key role in the Rockets getting off an incredibly amount of 3-pointers, but they know it’s going to be tough to beat them four times in seven games if Harden isn’t the efficiency monster he is against everyone else.
Next: The simple way Klay Thompson gets open off screens
Unless otherwise noted, all statistics are gathered from NBA.com.