By: Paul McGuire
Good teams don’t win close games. Good teams avoid close games.
It is a powerful sports adage because it is true. The Houston Rockets had their chances to win this game. There are good things to take away from this loss. But the one big thing which has continually held Houston back throughout this season reared up again and gave the Rockets a close game down the stretch. And in that stretch, Evan Fournier made a tough shot by the paint, Dwight Howard missed the lob, and James Harden was held like it was a football game Marcus Thornton missed a three-pointer to tie the game at the very end.
So what was that one big thing which cost Houston the game? The willingness and ability to execute and hustle on defense.
Yup. Again. Still, things were somewhat better compared to the earlier travesties this season.
I can start by pulling up a tweet I made during the second quarter:
https://twitter.com/PaulKMcGuire/status/679827148228669441
There were three stretches of horrible defense by the Rockets. The beginning of the first quarter, where Vucevic scored over Dwight and Capela and inspired no small amount of Magic fans cheering over Howard's decline (side note: while I know why Magic fans despise Howard, I have to admit that I don't really get it. The hatred of Magic fans for Howard is quite a bit more than say, Hornets/Pelicans fans towards Chris Paul or Jazz fans towards Deron Williams).
The beginning of the second quarter, where Gordon and the Magic ran the Rockets out of the building in transition.
And most importantly, the entire third quarter, where...well, I don't really know what happened there. Or rather, it was a colossal mess of poor half-court execution, as the Magic just ran screen and rolls, more screen rolls and finished that mess with a 13-point lead at the end of the third quarter.
Forrest pointed out on Monday's game how the Charlotte Hornets offense was incredibly well-executed, but the Hornets just could not seem to hit anything that tonight. Well, the Magic's offense was also incredibly well-executed and had a lot of crisp pasing, surprisingly so for a team coached by Scott Skiles. But the Magic actually have athletic players who are also capable of spacing the floor, and this made a huge difference against a Rockets team which really does not have a lot of athleticism. Howard struggled to both watch Vucevic out near the three-pointer and guard a slashing Elfrid Payton/Evan Fournier. As Bickerstaff chose to run with a small-ball lineup tonight, there was no second big man to help him.
The Rockets got better during the fourth quarter by forcing turnovers and playing aggressively against Oladipo and Payton. But even when the Rockets scored for several straight possessions after they had reduced the lead to three to five points, they kept giving points right back for a while longer. And then time ran out and it came to a coin flip which never should have happened in the first place.
Still, this loss was quite a bit better compared to the beginning of the season. Houston was better on the offensive end and did not totally devolve into "Harden, do something." There was an excellent play in the first quarter where the Rockets hustled for two offensive rebounds, had a good drive from Ty Lawson, and then finished with a Capela finish at the rim. Houston's fourth quarter comeback was both a combination of Lawson and a steady diet of dishes to Howard at the rim.
Lawson was the other big positive of tonight. It's a sign of how far he's fallen that I was surprised when Lawson was the first player off the bench and not sitting at the very end. In the second quarter there, he was better than the train wreck he's been all season, but nothing fantastic. But then in the fourth quarter, he had seven points and joined in the "Feed Howard" party. There were even possessions where he drove, dished out to Harden, who then took a more open three-pointer; just like Rockets fans had been hoping for at the beginning of this season.
And in other positive news, Donatas Motiejunas had a fantastic underhanded alley-oop to Dwight Howard that had me jump up. Motiejunas's passing was really something tonight, and the Rockets are lucky to have so many good big men. Jones also had a great game and jump started Houston's offense during that first bad first-quarter stretch.
Well, the Rockets are back at .500. And now they get to play a Spurs team on Christmas that in a normal NBA season would probably be the best team in the league.
Alas, it has not been a normal season by any stretch of the imagination. The Magic are good, the Pelicans are bad, and the Rockets are now just mediocre. It is a testament to how bad this season has been that "mediocre" sounds like an accomplishment now.
