HOUSTON — As the dejected Houston Rockets ambled to the sideline with 7:49 remaining in their Game 1 first-round series against the Golden State Warriors, Steven Adams stopped midway, his hands on his knees while he bent over.
Adams needed to catch his breath. The nature of playoff basketball, exemplified in Houston’s 95-85 loss Sunday night, is a 48-minute bout, and the veteran center, who did the bulk of his battles around the glass was physically exhausted.
Mentally, however, Adams’s look of despair spoke volumes. Houston, which had trailed by as much as 23 points in the second half, had somehow whittled the deficit down to just four a few possessions earlier. But in a tale that has been repeated numerous times this season, the Rockets failed to generate consistent offense, allowing the Warriors to rebuild their lead. By the time the final buzzer sounded, Houston walked away having shot 39 percent from the field, 20 percent from 3 and 55 percent from the free-throw line — with 16 turnovers for good measure. A dismal showing, and not the type of start the Rockets hoped for after missing the postseason for five consecutive years.
“Not our best, obviously,” Rockets coach Ime Udoka said. “We only scored 85 (points), that’s not a great offensive night and the numbers showed that. To hold somebody to 95 (points), you’d expect to win if you have a decent offensive night.”
In the hours before Game 1, Udoka was named a finalist for NBA Coach of the Year, a testament to the work he and his staff have done since October — winning 52 games, finishing second in the Western Conference and boasting a top-three defense.
On Sunday night, however, Warriors coach Steve Kerr routinely had the upper hand, putting the Rockets in a tactical bind and an uncomfortable position that was all too familiar.
To say Houston’s half-court production was suboptimal would be putting it lightly. According to Cleaning the Glass, the Rockets scored just 65.5 points per 100 half-court plays.
“We just didn’t execute,” guard Fred VanVleet said. “Maybe the physicality was an issue, but I thought we matched that for the most part. Execution was a little sticky. Here and there you give credit to the defense. We can do a lot better in that area.”
Over the next 48 hours, the Rockets will peruse the film, get back on the practice court and attempt to course correct. The playoffs, as they always say, are a chess match. But the biggest worry for a largely inexperienced group is that nothing that the Warriors presented defensively on Sunday was out of the norm. According to Synergy tracking data, Golden State is among the league leaders in loading up in the paint, and Houston faces zone more than most teams — particularly because of their abundance of size and lack of shooting.
In other words, the Rockets already knew what was coming.
Over 82 games, Houston’s offense faced a zone defense on 300 possessions, fifth-most in the league. They scored just .900 points per possession, which ranks 27th in the NBA. When the Rockets go small, as Udoka often loves to do, Tari Eason and Amen Thompson share the floor (Udoka rolled with an eight-man rotation in Game 1). But because Thompson isn’t a spacing threat and opposing teams aren’t exactly fearful of Eason’s shooting, switching to a zone defense is smart. This same approach also applies to some of Udoka’s favored double-big lineups. Golden State used several different looks; 1-3-1, 2-3 and even some boxes and elbows (also referred to as a box-and-one).
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Give credit to Golden State’s approach, which was fluid depending on the personnel. The Warriors made a concerted effort to disrupt VanVleet and Jalen Green’s flow, holding Houston’s backcourt to just 17 combined points on 7-of-34 shooting. The Rockets often played deep into the shot clock against a tenacious defense — a recipe for disaster. Houston coughed the ball up 17 times, which Golden State capitalized on, scoring 25 points off their mistakes.
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“I don’t think necessarily it was just a bad shooting night,” forward Jabari Smith Jr. said. “That had something to do with it, but we got to work hard and generate better looks. Our spacing was a little thrown off tonight. They were crowding the paint a lot on us, and we just got to figure out (how) to counteract that. Watch film and figure out ways to go about that. They were packing the paint trapping Jalen and Fred, funneling everything, trying to make us make the extra pass and we weren’t making it tonight. Everybody, me, turning the ball over.”
Houston’s youth witnessed the unspoken advantage of experience and championship cache. Since training camp, Udoka has preached an equal opportunity offense, hoping to draw in the power of the collective and amplify individual strengths as a whole. And that approach certainly works, from October to March.
But in April, when the going gets tough and games turn into absolute slugfests, there’s an inherent value in having a Steph Curry or Jimmy Butler, players who can generate offense out of thin air. The Rockets held the Warriors to just 95 points, a tremendous accomplishment, but Curry and Butler combined for 56 points on efficient shooting. The pair took turns in the second half scoring tough bucket after tough bucket, a snowball effect that can demoralize the best defenses. Between Curry and Butler, that’s two decades of playoff experience from your top two offensive weapons, a luxury the Rockets simply don’t have right now.
The good news for Houston is it’s only one game and, all things considered, a decent portion of in-game mistakes can be cleaned up. The Rockets missed nine free throws in a 10-point loss and trailed by just four points with around two minutes to go. Had a few possessions down the stretch gone differently, there could have easily been a different outcome. Elsewhere, they enjoyed a strong advantage on the glass (52 to 36) and offensive rebounding in particular (22 to 6), a theme the Rockets will need to lean into over the coming games.
“That’s what we do,” VanVleet said. “We’re going to continue to do that. I think we can generate better looks, I think our spacing can get better, I think we can make more shots, obviously. Myself included; (I) didn’t shoot the ball great tonight. We missed nine free throws. Steph (Curry) hit some crazy shots. I liked our fight and intensity, but it’s about execution.”
Parting thoughts
• Alperen Şengün, who finished his playoff debut with 26 points and nine rebounds, was Houston’s best player in Game 1 by a country mile. Şengün was able to find success by attacking Golden State’s interior, punishing its lack of size (Draymond Green started at center.) If this is going to be a series in which players like Kevon Looney and Gui Santos play limited minutes, Houston needs to continue to play through Şengün. Udoka isn’t one to do that with this group, but if there’s a tweak to be made ahead of Game 2, it likely lies with the Turkish big — running half-court offense through him and allowing him to create plays off of it.
• Jalen Green, who’s averaging just 5.25 points over his last four outings, is in a scoring funk and having a difficult time adjusting to recent aggressive defenses he’s faced (Warriors, Denver Nuggets, LA Lakers, LA Clippers). Green thrives on early rhythm, but Golden State is a premier help defense team and is sending the kitchen sink at the fourth-year guard whenever the ball is in his hands. However, Green is a 40 percent catch-and-shoot option. There needs to be a sweet spot between his spacing and driving gravity — and it’s on all parties involved to find some tweaks within the offensive setup.
(Photo of Dillon Brooks: Troy Taormina / Imagn Images)
