James Harden Comments on NBA Ruling He Pushed Off on Game-Winner vs. Warriors

James Harden scored the game-winning basket over Andre Iguodala with 2.7 seconds left to give the Houston Rockets a 97-96 victory over the Golden State Warriors in Thursday's Game 3:

On Friday, the NBA Officiating Last Two Minute Report deemed Harden pushed off on Iguodala, which gave him room to sink the final bucket, and noted the officials should have called an offensive foul: "Harden (Houston) initiates the contact with Iguodala (Golden State) to create space and dislodges him from his legal guarding position."

It didn't mean much to Harden, who spoke with The Vertical's Michael Lee on Saturday:

The ruling doesn't amend the result of the game, as the Rockets trail the Warriors 2-1 instead of facing a 3-0 hole heading into Sunday's Game 4.

The league could look at scenarios like this in the offseason, though, and possibly consider a rule change.

Instead of reviewing and announcing after the fact that a player had committed a foul, perhaps the NBA can implement a system to review and overturn such calls, or non-calls in this instance, during a contest.

This way, the games could see fairer results.

In the meantime, Harden, who is averaging 26.7 points per game in the series, can focus on trying to pull off one of the largest upsets in NBA playoff history.