Rockets fumble their way to embarrassing loss
April 5th, 2006by John
Yao posts up Portland’s Joel Pryzbilla Wednesday night. Yao had an off night, scoring only 13 points and grabbing 7 rebounds in an embarrassing 76-75 Rockets loss to one of the league’s worst teams. Click here for more photos from the game. by John
WEDNESDAY, 4/5/06 – The Rockets suffered one of their most embarrassing losses of the season Wednesday night, losing to Portland, the second-worst team in the league, losers of their last 11 in a row, and 21 of their last 23 games!! Not only that, but the Blazers’ last 6 losses were by an average of 18 points!
The Rockets showed absolutely no poise, and did just about everything to give the game away by blowing layups and committing 9 turnovers in the fourth quarter alone. Every one of those lost possessions was crucial in this close, 76-75 loss. It was like the Keystone Cops out there. When Yao is not on, the Rockets can be a very bad team.
So who were the culprits in this loss? Just about everyone, except maybe Luther Head.
Luther scored 13 points on 6-of-11 shooting, and went one-on-one against Theo Ratliff on a fast break to hit a sweet reverse layup with 1:17 remaining to give the Rockets a 75-74 lead.
But then the Rockets let Sebastian Telfair drive across the lane, stop, and pop a wide open jumper to give the Blazers a 76-75 lead. The Rockets had over 27 seconds remaining to win it, though.
On that last possession, Luther took the first shot, a three-pointer, with 7 seconds remaining that missed. Yao fought very hard to get the rebound with four seconds remaining, and then made a strong move in the lane with two guys on him to get off a tough shot. But it clanged off the back iron, and that was the ballgame.
The Rockets should have never been put into the position where they had to hit a last second shot to win it. After all, this was the freakin’ 20-53 Portland TrailBlazers. You had a feeling when the Rockets committed 3 turnovers in the first quarter on simple outlet passes alone, it was going to be a long night. It didn’t get much better from there, with the Rockets tying the Blazers at the end of the first quarter for an atrocious 17-17 tie.
If it wasn’t for Keith Bogans scoring 8 points in the second quarter, the game could have been out-of-hand by halftime. Instead, Portland only led 43-39 at the half.
But things went south in the third as the Rockets fell behind 51-41. Luckily Bogans and Luther Head kept them in the game, with Luther hitting all 4 of his shots to score 9 points, and the Rockets going on a 21-8 run to lead at the end of three quarters, 62-59. With Yao only having scored 8 points at that point, you had a feeling the Rockets were going to stop fooling around and let Yao take over.
Even though the Rockets’ defense was superb in the fourth quarter holding the Blazers to 6-of-17 shooting, Houston’s offense stunk it up, hitting only 5-of-13 shots. Yao scored 5 points in the fourth quarter, but missed two free throws late that really hurt. However, those 9 team turnovers in the fourth quarter (17 overall) were the killer.
For the game, Yao had 5 turnovers, and Luther, Juwan Howard, and Bogans all had three TOs each. In addition, Bogans blew an easy layup that could have given the Rockets a 3-point lead in the final minute.
When you couple those turnovers with lousy shooting from Rafer Alston (2-of-12) and Stromile Swift (1-of-5), you now know why Jeff Van Gundy called this team “undertalented” after the Rockets loss to Seattle Tuesday night. The problem is…he’s the guy who brought in most of these players. Does that make him an undertalented evaluator of talent?
You know what else hurts? On a night Alston scored 5 points on his 17% shooting, 10 assists and 3 rebounds, Toronto’s Mike James scored 34 points on 13-of-26 shooting, grabbed 11 rebounds and dished 8 assists. Daryl Morey (future Rockets GM), we can’t wait for you to make your impact!
To see the boxscore from the game, click here.
To read the Houston Chronicle’s article about the game, click here.