Houston Rockets: Top 10 moments from James Harden’s historic season
4. The 58-10-7 game against the Heat
In a contest that marked the second game of a back-to-back set for the Rockets, Harden would turn in arguably one of his greatest games of the season despite going to work on limited rest.
On an evening where Houston trailed by as many as 21 points against the Miami Heat in the third quarter, Harden would stamp his official imprint on the contest at the most ideal time, scoring 34 of his game-high 58 points in the second half to lead the Rockets to a 121-118 win on Feb. 28.
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"“We get the stat sheet at the end of the game, and I saw he had 58,” Rockets guard Austin Rivers told members of the media after Harden’s sixth 50-point game of the year. “All of us were like, ‘He had that many points?’ We had no idea he had that many points. That’s a lot of points. He was incredible.”"
Although most Heat players might have been stunned to witness Harden shoot at a 50 percent clip to shred their infamous 2-3 zone, scoring was far from the only thing that The Beard managed to do exceptionally well throughout the night.
Harden — who was accountable for 83 of Houston’s 121 points — capped off his red-hot shooting performance with 10 assists and seven rebounds. In addition to outscoring Miami’s entire second unit by himself, the former assist champion terrorized Heat defenders such as Josh Richardson and Justise Winslow, nailing several step-back jumpers and shots on one-on-one drives inside to help the Rockets close out February strong.