James Harden and Kyrie Irving became unlikely teammates in January 2021 when Harden was traded from the Houston Rockets to the Brooklyn Nets to create one of the most offensively potent ‘Big Three’ we have ever seen.
However, a season and a half of injuries and COVID took its toll enough for Harden to ask out of Brooklyn, with a key reason being Kyrie’s unwillingness to get vaccinated. The messy relationship finally ended with Harden being traded to the Philadelphia 76ers for Ben Simmons on Feb 10, exactly a month prior to the first matchup between the new-look Nets and Sixers.
The Nets comfortably beat the 76ers with Kyrie Irving playing phenomenal defense on James Harden, holding Harden to the worst performance in his early 76ers career. ESPN analyst Stephen A. Smith tore into Harden for his performance.
“The brother picked up James Harden from the opening tip. Tip-off time came and Kyrie Irving was guarding James Harden. They were getting in positions to double James, but Kyrie was like ‘ get away, I got him’. All of this noise you’re hearing about what transpired between the two in practice may be true. I dismissed it until Thursday night. James Harden, this is not a good night for you. When you see somebody step up and go like this ‘it’s me and you now, what’s up’, Kyrie did that. Harden didn’t show up.”
While the report of Harden and Irving having an intense 1-on-1 in practice while teammates have been proven false by the very source it came from, this game definitely had a lot more animosity to it.
Irving’s performance was sensational and Harden has to continue battling the question of whether he can turn up in big moments. Hopefully, we can get a playoff series between the two teams to answer some of these questions.
