Yao gets pulled down, but pushes back with scoring barrage to sink Sonics
Tuesday, April 10th, 2007
by John
Yao goes up for a shot against Seattle’s Nick Collison on Monday night. Later in the third quarter, Collison would pull Yao down to the floor on a flagrant foul, and Yao would retaliate by hitting alot of shots to finish with 15 points in the third, and 31 overall. Click here for more photos from the game.
Unfortunately this blog entry has to be somewhat short because of some work I had to get done tonight. But I have to say that I was impressed with the up-tempo style of play the Rockets played against the Seattle Sonics to win 95-90.
Yao Ming was the man (again), scoring 31 points on 10-of-19 shooting and hitting all 11 of his free throws. The Sonics didn’t have anyone who could stop him, and they obviously don’t have the personnel to play the kind of team defense that Golden State or Phoenix plays against him.
Probably the most exciting play that involved Yao occurred with 5:06 remaining in the third quarter with the Rockets up 62-59.
Yao was running down court on a fast break and got great position down low on Nick Collison. Yao went up for the shot as his body was moving toward the basket, and Collison put his right arm on Yao’s hip while also pulling down on Yao’s shooting arm with his left hand.
Yao has a tendency to fall to the floor on these kinds of shots, probably because he’s so big and it’s safer for him to have his body fall to the floor — like a stuntman would — than try to use his legs to stop all the momentum behind his upper body.
But with Collison having his arms on Yao as he was falling, it looked like it was a flagrant foul, but in my opinion it was really hard to tell if Yao’s falling to the ground was all of a result of Collison, or Yao was falling anyway, or a little bit of both.
After the game, Yao definitely thought Collison pulled him down. But if you look at the slow-motion replays carefully, it showed Yao had a lot of momentum as he was falling to the floor, and that it could have been deceiving. Regardless, if you watched the game in live action like the refs saw it, you would think it was flagrant, and that’s what they called.
When Yao hit the floor, he was writhing in pain and held his elbow after hitting it hard on the floor. Seeing Yao be the victim of a called flagrant foul by the refs, and also in pain, T-Mac took exception to Collison’s foul on Yao. Wanting to protect his big man and make a statement, T-Mac came up to him and shoved him with his right hand.
Yao goes up for a shot against Seattle’s Nick Collison on Monday night. Later in the third quarter, Collison would pull Yao down to the floor on a flagrant foul, and Yao would retaliate by hitting alot of shots to finish with 15 points in the third, and 31 overall. Click here for more photos from the game. Unfortunately this blog entry has to be somewhat short because of some work I had to get done tonight. But I have to say that I was impressed with the up-tempo style of play the Rockets played against the Seattle Sonics to win 95-90.
Yao Ming was the man (again), scoring 31 points on 10-of-19 shooting and hitting all 11 of his free throws. The Sonics didn’t have anyone who could stop him, and they obviously don’t have the personnel to play the kind of team defense that Golden State or Phoenix plays against him.
Probably the most exciting play that involved Yao occurred with 5:06 remaining in the third quarter with the Rockets up 62-59.
Yao was running down court on a fast break and got great position down low on Nick Collison. Yao went up for the shot as his body was moving toward the basket, and Collison put his right arm on Yao’s hip while also pulling down on Yao’s shooting arm with his left hand.
Yao has a tendency to fall to the floor on these kinds of shots, probably because he’s so big and it’s safer for him to have his body fall to the floor — like a stuntman would — than try to use his legs to stop all the momentum behind his upper body.
But with Collison having his arms on Yao as he was falling, it looked like it was a flagrant foul, but in my opinion it was really hard to tell if Yao’s falling to the ground was all of a result of Collison, or Yao was falling anyway, or a little bit of both.
After the game, Yao definitely thought Collison pulled him down. But if you look at the slow-motion replays carefully, it showed Yao had a lot of momentum as he was falling to the floor, and that it could have been deceiving. Regardless, if you watched the game in live action like the refs saw it, you would think it was flagrant, and that’s what they called.
When Yao hit the floor, he was writhing in pain and held his elbow after hitting it hard on the floor. Seeing Yao be the victim of a called flagrant foul by the refs, and also in pain, T-Mac took exception to Collison’s foul on Yao. Wanting to protect his big man and make a statement, T-Mac came up to him and shoved him with his right hand.