Or you are Doomed to repeat it. This regular season game is exhibit A for why we (and especially Harden) go through hair-pulling, falling apart, absolute discombobulation in the playoffs. Yes, it's the refs. But it's not only the refs. Different refs play by different rules. DUH. Happens all the time, has happened since the beginning of time. Is it right? no. Can we do anything about it? no. The Tony Brothers and Scott Fosters of the world aren't going away anytime soon. Have a god**** plan B. Use picks in the midrange. Stop driving it when they are letting all contact go. Take a page out of the postup Harden midrange stepback playbook. Run EG off a few easy midrange screens. We might pull this one out, but I hate watching every year as soon as the whistles are swallowed, our only gameplan is to drive it harder into a horde of defenders to try to get the refs to call something. Then out of frustration: stepback 3, stepback 3, jackup 3. Yes it works sometimes. No, that still doesn't make it a good solution. We fall apart when Harden can't draw fouls. Every time he drives it's basically an automatic turnover because someone will hack him and they get the ball. Instead, Run Harden off a screen and get him the ball in the post. Run a few cuts and try to get an easy look at the basket. The only way we scored at the end of the half was Capela feeds and putbacks. MDA needs to stop looking solely at the refs and instead occasionally look in the mirror and call a timeout, or run a different play. Also, our team whines way too much when the refs get out of hand. MDA, Harden, CP3, EG with his hands up. It just looks bad and without temperate refs, it's asking for them to go against you. Know how the game is being called. ADAPT.
