The Houston Rockets have the chance to start a winning streak with a back-to-back set against the LA Clippers tonight. Before the All-Star, this means more for them than people on the surface believe.
Houston has lost two of its last three games, and while a 112-106 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder on Saturday got the team back on track, it was against an injury-riddled opponent. Before that, the Rockets suffered defeats to the Boston Celtics and Charlotte Hornets by an average margin of 15.5 points.
What’s more is that the organization was one of three teams that stayed dead silent ahead of the NBA trade deadline. While this year saw record-setting movement, Houston didn’t address its glaring need at the point guard position. Instead, it will look to the buyout market for any sort of solution, having to sign someone before the playoffs.
Regardless, the Rockets’ recent shortcomings have resulted in a drop in The Athletic’s latest NBA power rankings from Law Murray. Ranked fifth last week, Houston has slid to seventh, one spot in front of the Cleveland Cavaliers and one behind the Denver Nuggets in Tier 2 of five groups.
“The Rockets switched it up this week, winning some close games while getting blown out at home on back-to-back nights against Eastern Conference visitors,” Murray wrote. “And Ime Udoka had to call out Alperen Şengün’s raggedy defense yet again, a staple of Udoka’s tenure.
“But Houston didn’t do anything to its standard contract roster. After all, this is a team that completed a seven-team trade just to acquire and extend Durant this offseason, only for Fred VanVleet to tear his ACL, for Steven Adams to suffer a season-ending ankle injury and for Dorian Finney-Smith to look like a shell of himself coming off ankle surgery.”
Murray gave each team a newcomer to watch after a busy deadline, but because Houston didn’t bring in any new faces, Durant was chosen. The 37-year-old is in the midst of another All-NBA-caliber season, averaging 25.9 points, 5.3 rebounds and 4.4 assists on 51-40-88 shooting splits.
The Rockets, without VanVleet, have been forced to run the point guard position by committee, and it has resulted in A LOT of turnovers, 15.3 per game to be exact. They have forced stars like Durant, Sengun and Amen Thompson to initiate offense out of position, and with Adams out too, it only puts more responsibility on the stars.
