The Houston Rockets looked at times last night as if they were going to pull away for a shocking victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder at the Toyota Center. After suffering a blowout the night before in Oklahoma and missing Kyle Lowry and Courtney Lee to injury, the odds were stacked against the shorthanded Rockets. But Houston held a 12-point lead late in the 3rd quarter and even led by three late in the fourth. Without Lowry, Goran Dragic played perhaps the best game of his young Rockets career (20 points and eight assists) and rookie Chandler Parsons, who nabbed his first NBA start, contributed hellacious defense on Kevin Durant. But the aforementioned Durant could not be contained for the duration, and the Thunder weathered the storm to win 98-95. Houston has now lost four in a row and sit with an unenviable 2-6 record despite the strong performance last night. Here are five reasons why the Rockets lost:
1) Offensive rebounding. The Thunder only edged the Rockets in total rebounding by three, and in offensive rebounding by four, but statistics don’t tell the story. Oklahoma City’s post players grabbed a series of crushing second-chance opportunities throughout the game at inopportune times, after Houston had secured a rare stop or Durant miss. I remember two occasions when Durant made a deep three after multiple offensive rebounds, and opponents cannot afford to give Durant second opportunities when he misses. Back to that later.
Giving up second-chance points contributed to an early hole for Houston, and prompted the use of an undersized lineup throughout much of the game to stabilize the rebounding problem; Samuel Dalembert and Jordan Hill did not get it done on the glass (seven total rebounds for Houston’s top two posts), so Patrick Patterson and Scola, along with the Rockets guards, had to overachieve to secure boards. The use of this smaller lineup left Houston without a shot blocker, soft in the middle of the defense. Meanwhile, Oklahoma’s starting center, Kendrick Perkins, grabbed nine rebounds, and received help from front court mate Serge Ibaka as well as bench stalwarts Nick Collison and Nazr Mohammed, who all grabbed six rebounds. The overall rebounding disparity may be slim, but when it came to each team’s post players’ work on the glass, the Thunder had a heavy advantage.
2) The Rockets’ bench. After Houston built a 12-point lead in the third, the second-team gave it up just as quickly, so the game was tied at 72 headed into the fourth. Fans could sense the eerie feeling in the air that Durant would make the jump shots in the final quarter that he hadn’t in the previous one, and that Houston had missed its opportunity to gain some separation on the scoreboard. Those fans were right.
Terrence Williams missed two relatively easy shots during the troublesome third quarter stretch, and essentially disappeared for the rest of the game. He has the tools but often looks like he doesn’t know what he wants to do on the court. Chase Budinger shot 3-8 from the field and missed all three of his three point attempts. He had a -17 rating on the court last night. And Johnny Flynn continues to inspire little to no confidence in his ability to run the point while also receiving steady abuse from the much bigger Russell Westbrook on defense. Westbrook scored the majority of his patented pull-up jumpers and post-up fadeaways when Flynn was guarding him.
3) Patrick Patterson’s miss. It’s easy to be hard on the player who has the guts to attempt a clutch shot and misses it, but Patterson’s late clunker really did hurt. Houston was up by one with less than a minute remaining and really had a chance to ice the game, but Patterson missed a wide-open 17-footer. The power forward, still recovering from offseason surgery, has struggled mightily with shaking the rust from his shot but appeared to be getting back on track with a 5-10 shooting performance last night. However, after Patterson’s miss, Durant would drain four consecutive free throws and the go-ahead basket on a long jump shot to give OKC the win. To say the miss was a momentum shifter would be accurate.
4) Kevin Durant, James Harden, and Russell Westbrook. Star power was the difference in this one. Houston didn’t have it, and OKC did. Durant had a horrid third quarter — he only made two threes last night and shot 10-25 for the game — but came through in the fourth with 13 points on his way to a typical 27. Even when the great players struggle, they still seem to fill their expected quota. He took over down the stretch when his team needed baskets, and made the go-ahead shot with 27 seconds left. Harden was an assassin at times, scoring efficiently and in bunches on his way to 16 points, draining two consecutive threes when the Thunder tied the game late in the third to steal crowd energy from Houston’s effort. He also entered the lane with seeming ease, creating opportunities for teammates. And Westbrook provided consistent scoring when his shinier teammate was struggling in the third. The point guard scored 25 points on 50 percent shooting, impressive considering most of the shots he took were longer jumpers. It’s also worth noting that the majority of Westbrook’s misses came toward the game’s conclusion, so it’s always important to have more than one star — in this case, Durant.
5) Nobody to take the last shot for Houston. This one is the most important. Despite the reasons mentioned above, Houston still had a chance to tie on the last shot, down by three with seven seconds left. But nobody seemed to know who should take the shot and, in a panic, Dragic threw the ball out of bounds to nobody. Game over. Under normal circumstances, Lowry might have taken the shot, or he might not have. That’s the point. Nobody knows who “the guy” is to step up and make the play. This can be an advantage in that other teams may have difficulty formulating a game plan to stop one individual, but it also makes for an awkward and confusing attempt to decide who gets to take the big shots on a game’s final play. Is it Luis Scola, even though he needs to create something near the basket? It sure isn’t Parsons, who looked unprepared for his crack at a final three, or Kevin Martin, who stayed about as far away from the ball in the closing seconds as he does from playing defense. Until Houston can land some stars, its confusion over who gets to step up at the end and its difficulty in closing out tight games will continue.
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