Joel Embiid says James Harden, Philadelphia 76ers need to be more aggressive, toughen up in order to break through

PHILADELPHIA — After acquiring James Harden at the trade deadline, the Philadelphia 76ers hoped this would finally be the year they break through and make it into the conference finals — and beyond — in the NBA playoffs.

Instead, for the fourth time in five years, Philadelphia saw its season come to an end in the second round Thursday night, losing 99-90 to the Miami Heat. Harden was a non-factor in the game, taking just nine shots — including two in the second half — and scoring 11 points.

That led Joel Embiid to say the 76ers did not get the version of Harden that won the NBA's Most Valuable Player award, and finished in the top three in voting three other times, in the deal, and that he — and the rest of the 76ers — weren't aggressive enough throughout the series.

«Since we got him, everybody expected the Houston James Harden,» Embiid said. «But that's not who he is anymore. He's more of a playmaker. I thought, at times, he could have been, as all of us could have been, more aggressive. All of us whether it was Tyrese [Maxey] or Tobias [Harris] or guys coming off the bench.

»And I'm not just talking about offensively. I'm talking about you know, as a whole offensively and defensively. I didn't think we were good defensively as a team. They took advantage of a lot of stuff that we tried to do defensively. And then offensively just really everybody being on the same page, obviously, only having probably what, three or four months to all work together and try to figure it out. Maybe it wasn't a lot of time.… I don't think we played our best basketball."

The 76ers certainly didn't play their best basketball in Games 5 and 6 in this series, when the Heat successfully ran them off the court twice in a row to close things