The Houston Rockets defeated the Golden State Warriors on Sunday night to all but guarantee their status as the two-seed heading into the playoffs. The Rockets’ final five games of the season were scheduled against five Western Conference playoff teams. So far, they are 2-0. If they can win even one more of the remaining three, they will ensure themselves the second seed. They appear to be going all out. Accordingly, the Rockets’ secret weapon has been fully unleashed.
Rockets’ Secret Weapon Unleashed In Final Push
There was a theory that head coach Ime Udoka might opt to hold something back over the Rockets’ brutal closing stretch. The Rockets’ young players will be in unfamiliar territory in the playoffs after all. They could use every advantage they can get, including the element of surprise. But Udoka opted for another approach. On defense, he’s unleashed point-of-attack night terror Amen Thompson to his fullest. On top of that, he’s overhauled the Rockets’ rotations and playstyle in order to match up against their two most recent opponents.
Muffling the Thunder
On Friday night, against the Thunder, the Rockets played big. That’s something they’ve been doing a fair bit of lately anyway, but not to the same extent. They actually started centers Steven Adams and Alperen Sengun together for the first time this season.
It was well known that the Thunder struggled against size in the 2023-24 playoffs. They were outrebounded in every loss to what was then Luka Doncic‘s Dallas Mavericks. They tried to address the issue with the offseason addition of former Houston rookie big Isaiah Hartenstein. But if Houston couldn’t attack the lanky Chet Holmgren at center, then they decided to just attack him at power forward instead. Sengun targeted him in the post, and Adams targeted him on the boards. The Rockets won the rebounding battle 48-33.
The biggest factor in the game may still have been the extremely unusual “off-game” from soon-to-be MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. SGA has been a pillar of consistency all year, partly by pillorying his opponents from the free-throw line. Against the Rockets, however, he took only two attempts from there. The 30-point specialist was also held to just 10 of 22 from the field for 22 points. Thompson’s defense led the Rockets in hampering him all night, a defensive performance that reached a crescendo with an improbable block on an SGA jumper.
Mollifying the Warriors
On Sunday night, against the surging Warriors, the Rockets again borrowed from the history books. Shutting down Stephen Curry has been viewed as the secret to beating the Warriors since time immemorial (or at least 2016). But rarely has so successful an effort been chronicled. The three-point wizard was kept true to the bit on Sunday night with just three total points for the game. The Rockets held him to 10 shot attempts and forced four turnovers out of him. The strategy worked. The Rockets prevailed in a heated encounter, in which Warriors star Draymond Green was assessed a technical and a flagrant for separate suspect elbow usages.
As elite as Thompson’s defense is, the Rockets knew that stopping Curry is never a one-man effort. Rockets veteran Fred VanVleet knows this only too well. He was famously the one in the box-and-one strategy deployed against Curry in the 2019 finals. But even as his specific assignment was to fight through screens and trail Curry all across the court, the entire box (containing four premier defenders) mirroring Curry’s every move behind him as well. Every single Rockets player chased Curry off the three-point line every chance they got. When even Adams is lumbering his way up above the three-point line instead of lurking near the restricted one, you know the team is taking a shooter seriously.
Thompson’s Defense Won’t Be Rockets’ Secret Much Longer
But Thompson has been well and truly unleashed as the Rockets’ number-one option on defense. Thompson is third this season in defensive field goal differential among players who’ve played at least 65 games. Opponents’ shooting percentage drops from an expected 46.3% to 40.6% when he has them in his sights. DPOY award discussions await in Thompson’s future. Assuming it’s not a Victor Wembanyama blowout (which realistically and regrettably would require another extraterrestrial injury), Thompson’s credentials could start being brought up as soon as next season.
The Last Word
The Rockets haven’t shored up the two-seed just yet. If they lost all three remaining games, and the Los Angeles Lakers won all four of theirs (including a Rockets-Lakers clash), then they would be pipped at the finishing post. Almost blowing out the best team in the league and following it up by beating an established rival is the best way Houston could have hoped to start this closing stretch though. Rather than holding anything back for the postseason, the Rockets are practicing their adjustments now. They have a reputation for being dogs already this season. Now the most dogmatic defender among them has been let off the leash.
Photo credit: © Cary Edmondson-Imagn Images
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