The Rockets have plays now

Since arriving in Houston, McHale and the coaching staff have implemented a ‘read-and-react’ style offence. The idea was that they wouldn’t run many plays, but would rely on players’ ability to find the open man, usually as a result of drive-and-kick style action. To start with, the offence was quite basic, but as time goes on more and more wrinkles have been added. As the motion gets more and more intricate, it becomes difficult to tell if the Rockets have kept to the principle of a play-light offence or are now running sets from the practice court. The first half of the Rockets’ overtime win over the Timberwolves seemed especially full of possessions that could well have been drawn up by the coaches. In this article I will take a look at a few that I found interesting.

Play #1:

At the end of the first quarter the Rockets set up in the sort of formation that makes Clyde Drexler say things like “1-4 flat!” as if he thinks he’s saying something insightful (fortunately I had the excellent Timberwolves announcers for this game so I didn’t have to listen to him). The play unfolds:

1. Papanikolaou comes up to set what looks like a routine ball screen for Harden, but at the last moment switches the direction of the pick.
2. Harden goes away from the screen, drawing the attention of both defenders, then flips the ball back to Kostas.
3. Budinger is forced to close out. This triggers a defensive rotation as Young must now choose between leaving Garcia or Johnson unmarked.
4. Kostas takes advantage of Budinger’s close out to blow by him. As he turns the corner, Johnson starts a backdoor cut.
5. Because of the attention drawn by Papanikolaou, Johnson is wide open and get to the rim for free throws.

Because of the time situation, you have to think that this is something the Rockets have gone through beforehand. It would certainly be nice to see the Rockets have some go-to sets to use in situations where there’s some clock pressure instead of just iso-ing Harden. The misdirection on the initial pick worked very nicely to get Papanikolaou free, and I’d very much like to see the Rockets run this again at some point. Also, you may have noticed Johnson and Garcia switching places at the beginning of the play. If you watch Johnson’s game-winner again, you’ll see them doing the exact same thing as the play develops. It’s a nice wrinkle to keep the defence on its toes.

 Play #2:

This set played out perfectly until the final pass. I’ve put in the whole sequence for completeness, but the magic happens in the first few seconds of the play.

1. Jason Terry runs a fairly standard pick-and-pop with Motiejunas. At this point the defence is still fairly well set.
2. D-Mo takes a dribble and then executes a hand-off to Harden.
3. The hand-off turns into a pick-and-roll as Motiejunas dives to the basket and receives a pocket pass from Harden. This forces Gorgui Dieng to rotate over to help.
4. The moment Motiejunas receives the ball, Papanikolaou begins a baseline cut. Motiejunas spots this and throws him the pass.
5. Unfortunately, the position that Terry moved to after his initial part in the play meant that his defender (LaVine) could sneak into the lane and disrupt the pass on a smart defensive rotation.

These are the sort of motions the Rockets tend to use a lot of as part of their normal offensive flow. But I think this may have been called in advance on the basis of how Terry cleared out to give Harden and D-Mo the far side of the floor to themselves. They knew ahead of time what the spacing needed to be for the play they were about to run. It certainly looked pretty until it fell apart at the end!

Play #3:

This play should feel familiar – I’ve definitely seen the Rockets run it before. It’s a nice way to get Harden moving to the basket where he can do what he does best.

1. The action starts with Papanikolaou setting a screen for Terry on the near side. Note that because D-Mo is trailing the play, Dieng has positioned himself at the top of the key to help on any penetration from this.
2. D-Mo sets a drag screen for Harden off the ball. Because of where Dieng has positioned himself, Harden’s defender has no help to allow him to recover from the screen.
3. Harden curls around the screen and catches the ball on the move. He is now one-on-one with Dieng with no prospect of help defence arriving. Harden draws the foul and gets to the line.

Quick hitters like this are a great way to sneak some extra points when the defence isn’t quite at peak intensity. Harden is far too deadly to contain when he’s given a scenario like this to work with, and it would be great if the Rockets could find a few more plays like this to get him to the middle without the lane being clogged with defenders.