The Lakers’ New King: Harden’s Template Helps Kobe Defend His Title

Jiang Che wakes up to find himself a benchwarmer and water boy at the end of the Lakers’ roster, facing the desperate scene of Game 3 of the 2011 Western Conference Finals. Kobe is carrying the team alone. The Lakers trail 0–2, and Dallas’s American Airlines Center is roaring. “Ding! The peak James Harden template has been activated!” Thirty-six points and fifteen assists in the Western Conference Finals turn the series around against the Mavericks. In the Finals, he becomes the sharpest spear, cutting down the Heat’s Big Three. A new legend for the Purple and Gold begins with rewriting that humiliating summer when they were swept.