The infamous Banana Boat will live to see another day.
Longtime friends and NBA legends in their own right, Dwyane Wade of the Miami Heat and Chris Paul of the Houston Rockets played against each other for the last time Thursday night, and the game was nothing short of emotions before, during and after.
To start, Paul and his son, Chris Paul II, showed up rocking all-Wade gear. Insert the flame emojis here.
Then, Wade, the longtime veteran who is retiring from the NBA after 16 seasons, got a standing ovation from the crowd at Houston’s Toyota Center.
Wade also hit the Rockets with his classic trademark fake a few times.
After the game, Wade continued his tradition of swapping jerseys, and obviously switched with Paul. Both of them rock No. 3.
“It’s always going to last,” Paul told reporters postgame when asked about his relationship with Wade. “I was there in ’06 when D-Wade won the championship in Dallas. We’ve all been to each other’s weddings. This might be the first time in my career where my son wore someone else’s jersey to a game and it’s not weird.”
But for as much as Wade’s #OneLastDance makes everyone warm and fuzzy inside, we can’t forget James Harden.
Yeah, that guy — the MVP.
Harden finished with 58 points, 10 assists, seven rebounds, four steals and one block. He was 16-of-32 from the field and 8-of-18 from three-point range, in addition to a perfect 18-of-18 from the free-throw line.
His stat line has become the norm, so much so that it didn’t even seem like the biggest deal in the Rockets’ 121-118 comeback win over the Heat.
It was the sixth 50-point performance of the season for Harden, making him the only NBA player to hit the milestone more than once in the 2018-19 season, and it was the 15th 50-point performance of his career. Only Wilt Chamberlain, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant and Elgin Baylor have scored 50 points more times in NBA history.
No player had ever dished out at least 10 assists in a 50-point performance, but Harden has now done it seven times.
“He’s definitely one of the most unguardable players this game has ever seen,” Wade said, of Harden postgame.
Harden was in a little slump pre-All Star break, but the defending MVP seems back to normal, now averaging a league-high 36.6 points per game.
The Rockets are still sitting in fifth place in the Western Conference (37-25), and now off to play three of the top teams in the Eastern Conference.
