The Philadelphia 76ers introduced Nick Nurse as their new head coach on June 1 and the NBA champion made a pitch to James Harden, who can become an unrestricted free agent this summer if he declines his 2023-24 player option.
Nurse, who won the 2019 championship with the Toronto Raptors, said “winning” has to be the Sixers’ selling point to Harden.
“Winning has to be the sell, right?” Nurse said Thursday. “Can we be good enough to win it all? That’s got to be a goal of his. And if it is, then he should stay here and play for us because I think there’s a possibility of that.”
NBA NEWS & TRADE RUMORS: Nick Nurse, James Harden & Philadelphia 76ers Updates
The Sixers lost to the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference Semifinals in seven games. Harden is expected to decline his player option and enter free agency this offseason. The 10-time All-Star averaged 21.0 points, 6.1 rebounds and 10.7 assists this season while shooting 44.1% from the field, 38.5% from beyond the arc and 86.7% from the free-throw line.
“I look at it this way,” Nurse said. “I don’t really vibrate on the frequency of the past. To me, when we get a chance to start and dig into this thing a little bit, it’s going to be only focused on what we’re trying to do forward. [The past] doesn’t matter. Next season, whatever’s happened for the last how many whatever years doesn’t matter to me.
NBA NEWS & TRADE RUMORS: Nick Nurse, James Harden & Philadelphia 76ers Updates
“You guys have mentioned the second round to me twice already, and we’re going to hit that head-on. Like we know we’re going to be judged on how we play in the playoffs,” Nurse explained. “It was the same in Toronto; we hadn’t played that well, and certain players hadn’t played that well and all those kinds of things.
“So the reality is, that’s, that’s the truth. So, I would imagine from day one we’re going to talk about that and that we’re going to try to attack that, you know. We’re going to have to face it, and we’re going to have to rise above it,” Nurse explained.
The Sixers haven’t gotten past the second round of the playoffs since 2001.
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