The LA Clippers weren’t going to have an All-Star starter. But the question was whether point guard James Harden or one of his teammates, such as shooting guard Norman Powell or center Ivica Zubac, would represent the team in San Francisco with Kawhi Leonard missing the start of the season.
“Somebody’s got to make it,” Harden said after his third 40-point game of the season in a win over the Milwaukee Bucks last month. “We’ve put the work in. We put ourselves in a really good position.”
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The NBA head coaches selected Harden as an All-Star reserve. He earned his 11th selection and his first since a 10-year streak was snapped in 2023. Harden is the 16th All-Star in franchise history — and the oldest at 35.
“For James, it’s a great individual award just to be an All-Star,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said. “It’s only 24 players selected out of 450 players. He’s been at the elite level before. It’s good to see him get back there. People recognize how much he means to a team and what he does.”
Harden has had better numbers in his Hall of Fame career. He is averaging 21.3 points, but on a career-low 39.5-percent shooting from the field. After dropping a season-best 17 assists Saturday night against the Utah Jazz, Harden’s 8.6 assists per game are a slight increase from last season, but his 4.5 turnovers per game are his highest in six seasons and rank third-most in the NBA.
But Harden’s stats aren’t why he is having a special season. He has made an impact on this Clippers team that must be acknowledged.
“He’s a selfless person,” said Derrick Jones Jr., the Clippers’ top free-agent addition in the offseason. “I mean, he’s all about the team. He wants to see the next guy be great. … He’s always there, he’s always available whenever you need him. Got something to talk about, go chop it up with him. That’s not normal for a lot of guys.”
The team enters the final week before the All-Star break with a 29-23 record, good for sixth place in the Western Conference despite significantly low expectations externally. Harden, along with Powell, the Clippers’ leading scorer, and Zubac, is part of the only trio in the league to have 10 games in which each player scored at least 20 points. For comparison, the Clippers’ trio of Harden, Leonard and Paul George had only seven games last season in which all three stars had at least 20 points in the same game. And the Clippers have the NBA’s second-best defense, the highest-ranked defense of any Harden team ever.
Harden, Powell, and Zubac scored 20+ points EACH for the 11th game this season – more than any other trio in the @NBA 👏@CarMax | #ClipperNation pic.twitter.com/Bw2asMNZVV
— LA Clippers (@LAClippers) February 9, 2025
Harden’s All-Star case is more about how he has made his teammates better and kept them together. And it all started shortly before training camp, during a week-long team excursion to Harden’s old stomping grounds in Arizona.
Harden signed a two-year contract to remain with the Clippers entering the 2024-25 season. His co-star, Leonard, was struggling with right knee inflammation. With Leonard sidelined and George and Russell Westbrook gone, Harden inherited the role of unquestioned team leader, a mantle he hadn’t had since before the Clippers traded Chris Paul to Harden’s Houston Rockets in 2017. Since then, Harden has shared teams and leadership roles with Paul and Westbrook in Houston, Kevin Durant with the Brooklyn Nets and Joel Embiid in Philadelphia — at least when his preseasons weren’t marred by rifts that wound up leading to early-season trades out of town.
Before the 2024-25 Clippers’ preseason began, Harden invited his teammates to join him in Arizona for a minicamp that he organized. There was five-on-five basketball at Arizona State, where Harden starred in college for two seasons. There were dinners in Scottsdale. There was softball. Everything was planned weeks in advance.
“We’re for the most part, a fairly new team,” Harden said during training camp in Honolulu. “You’ve got teams that have been together, especially their core, for five, six, seven years. You see Boston, they’ve been together for a very long time, and that’s how they got their first championship. So team building and chemistry is very, very important. And for me, I wanted to do a training camp in Scottsdale just to kind of get the guys hanging out, go to dinners, and things like that. You’re kind of away from your family. You get to just work out, hang out, just chat and get to know each other. That helps on the court as well.”
Most of the Clippers players participated. Leonard was there, although he was unable to play. Zubac and Nicolas Batum were still overseas. P.J. Tucker wasn’t with the team. But it was a chance for younger players to bond with the veterans, and for new additions like Jones, Kris Dunn, Mo Bamba and Kevin Porter Jr. to get to know their new teammates. Harden even had assistant coaches and training camp invitees such as Elijah Harkless, Alondes Williams, and RayJ Dennis on the trip, players who would go on to sign two-way contracts with other NBA teams.
“We know this is the crew that we got going into the season,” said Jordan Miller, a two-way contract player in his second season with the Clippers. “Everybody get out of the facility … the vets usually mix up the times when they come in, but the newer guys are usually there. And James was there a lot … just changing the environment.”
“We just played five-on-five, got familiar with everybody,” said Bamba, who added that he surprised his teammates with how well he played softball. “I think that was the first time KD (Kris Dunn) was around in the summer, so it was kind of fun to get to know him from a basketball standpoint a little bit.”
Being at Arizona State was an appropriate setting — Harden’s teammates got to see how he is adulated on Tempe’s campus.
“He really has a backing everywhere,” Miller said. “He really has love everywhere.”
The trip to Arizona was also a chance for teammates to see how approachable Harden is.
“Honestly, like him coming in earlier and being able to run pick-up and being there with the guys doing the conditioning and everything, I think it’s a good way to lead by example,” Powell said. “Bringing everybody together in Arizona for workouts and just like team bonding and stuff off the court, softball games, things like that, just bring the group closer together. So that way, nobody’s exempt from constructive criticism during a season. We’re all here fighting together. We’re going to the trenches together. If anybody sees something to help improve what we’re trying to get to and where we’re trying to go, being able to openly accept that. I think it’s going through a multitude of things together, on and off the court, helps open that up.”
Harden was maligned for his conditioning entering his final season in Houston in December 2020 as a means to force a trade. But Harden’s durability has been a key part of his career, and this season has been a re-dedication to that, as he has played in all but three games for the Clippers.
“Very impressed with how in shape he was coming into the season,” Miller said.
James Harden has embraced his role as team leader and mentor for the Clippers. ( Dan Hamilton / Imagn Images)
While Harden showed leadership before the games started, it needed to continue in practice and in the locker room once the regular season was underway. He has been a mentor for young guards Porter and Bones Hyland, both of whom have since been traded.
“James, for me, has been someone I look up to when it comes to basketball,” Porter said. “Being able to play with him now, I get to see different points on the court. Being a point guard, or coming from being a point guard and being with an MVP-caliber point guard now, I get to learn a lot. So I try to take advantage of that relationship.”
Hyland couldn’t attend Harden’s minicamp in Arizona and had been buried on the depth chart. But Harden and Hyland had lockers next to each other on almost every road trip. Hyland said that he and Harden clicked even before this season. “The first time I met him, we just became very close,” Hyland told The Athletic. Even with Hyland itching for a chance to show what he can do, he credits Harden for giving him the perspective he needs to get through the season.
“Just being with him, just being close to him, it’s been a blessing for me,” Hyland said. “Because when he first came into the league, he was a sixth man. He had to work his way up to the person that he is today. He knows the grind, he knows everything. It takes one opportunity, just like he was offered. And you got to take it, and you got to go with it, and you got to make it count. So that’s something that he’s been telling me, stay ready for my opportunity, you never know when it’s coming. It could be here, it could be somewhere else.”
Part of leadership is knowing you can’t lead just on your own. You have to delegate responsibility. That’s where Powell comes in. This season, the 31-year-old has raised his scoring from 13.9 points per game in 2024 to a career-best 24 points per game. Just as Powell has complemented Harden in LA’s offense, Powell has done the same as a team leader.
“I think this year, we really are a lot closer just because of that leadership role that I’m stepping into, being the one or two option every single night,” Powell said. “Me and him really talking and figuring out how we can best lead the team and making sure that we can get everybody to rally behind us and get the best out of every individual that’s playing. And the guys that are staying ready and being ready for their opportunity as well, we’ve been talking a lot with that.”
Of course, to lead effectively, you also have to play well. And Harden still wows his teammates with what he does on the floor. His first 40-point game of the season came right before Thanksgiving on the road against the Washington Wizards, when he dropped 43 points in only three quarters. It was the first time Harden scored 40 points in a game since the 2023 playoffs, and the first time in the regular season since March 2021.
“He’s one of the best ever to play this game,” Zubac said. “I was in the league when he was in Houston, when he was getting 50, 60. Like, it was crazy. To still be able to play at that level, it’s crazy. The way he’s leading us this year, on and off the court, the way he’s setting everyone up, it’s incredible. One of the best teammates ever. I think every player in the league would love to play with him.”
Harden’s efforts allowed the Clippers to bring Leonard along slowly. In January, Leonard finally debuted after missing the first 34 games. Leonard’s locker is next to Harden’s at Intuit Dome, and he praised Harden for how he has performed this season. Leonard can relate to Harden making it back to the All-Star game after a two-year absence. That was what happened with Leonard last season.
“He had the opportunity to carry the team throughout the first half of the season,” Leonard said. “Obviously last year, and the years before, he sacrificed some shots by the guys he was playing with. You can see he’s still a talented basketball player.”
Another Clipper could have taken Harden’s place on the All-Star team. But Harden is the face of the Clippers’ reward. And he wants to make sure that his team shares in the recognition.
“I mean, it’s not about me, it’s about the team,” Harden told The Athletic. “All-Star nod is a reflection of this team and what we’ve accomplished and what people from the beginning of the season thought we were going to do. That’s one of the reasons the Arizona trip happened, one of the reasons. The other is just me being a leader. I wanted to get guys on the same page as quickly as possible.”
Harden has a player option this offseason, but he also has said that he wants to retire a Clipper. The preseason Arizona trip could become an annual ritual.
“Amazing being able to be out there with the guys and just get a quick head start on things we were trying to do,” Jones said. “Just build on our communication and everything we wanted to be. Talked about everything we wanted to be this year, what we wanted to achieve this year. It was just a great bonding experience with the guys. Definitely going to do it again next year.”
(Top photo: Steph Chambers / Getty Images)
