That makes five wins in a row after the two losses to start the season. Perhaps the Rockets weren’t doomed after all? In any case, in a game where Kevin Durant shot poorly, and Alperen Sengun merely had
a good game, the Rockets won comfortably.
Amen Thompson was great. Tari Eason continues to make nearly every three pointer from the corners. Reed Sheppard seems to gradually spend more time looking like an NBA player and less like a rookie point guard. Tonight Reed’s 12 points were more than any individual starting for for Memphis aside from Ja Morant, and Morant did some significant fourth quarter padding, and played exactly twice as many minutes. Morant inevitably called up Sheppard in the pick and roll when he was in the game, but it didn’t all go Ja’s way. Far from it, at one such drive Sheppard picked him and went for a layup, for example. It’s always worth having a bit of patience with young players.
Jabari Smith feels like a player who is coming into his own, and could probably score a lot more, with more looks.
What the Rockets showed tonight, against a Memphis team that might be disgruntled, finding its way, or some combination of the two, was that there’s simply no respite for opponents when they play the Rockets.
The Rockets don’t exactly work like a great team, but right now they’re winning like one. Granted, the opposition hasn’t been world beaters since game one, but the opposition has hardly seemed to have much of a chance at winning, either. The Rockets grind opponents down in ways that are hard to specify as “Something Great Teams Do” but work well nonetheless. One is the offensive rebounding. Steven Adams wasn’t available for yet another game of revenge against Memphis tonight. It didn’t matter. For example, Clint Capela, who seems to have lost his ability to jump from standing, but still can block shots even so, and remains a very good rebounder, especially on the offensive boards, is difficult to deal with as a 3rd center.
Overall, the offensive rebounding of the Rockets is just a brutal thing for a defense to battle. That is to say, if the defense has played well, collapsed on Durant, made it tough for Sengun to pass, well, too bad, there’s Amen Thompson, waiting to clean up an offensive board, and tip in gently into the basket.
Thompson had a great night of this, and overall play. He went 28/10/7/2/0 with only two turnovers. He played 39 minutes, but some of the longer minutes had more to do with Memphis refusing to wave the white flag and pull the starters when it seemed evident there was no comeback for the Grizzlies in sight.
There are things to be said about the Rockets not-especially pretty offense. Things in its favor. One is, it might well hold up in the playoffs, where an offense has to be almost Platonically perfect to survive the grinder. The Rockets are in no danger of such glossy perfection. Two is, the Rockets look clunky, on offense especially, but also defense. They’re only going to get better, and their net rating margin is now the best in the NBA, above OKC, at 12.3.
They didn’t even do it with a free throw edge tonight. Memphis nearly doubled the Rockets up on free throws by falling down and grabbing their faces a lot, it seemed at times. It didn’t matter. Memphis went on runs at the beginning of quarters, but could never close the Rockets down.
This is a nice run, but a sterner test awaits Friday, as the Rockets battle the Spurs in the opening round of the NBA Cup, and try to win The Falcon.
