<div align="center"></div> <div align="center"><font color="purple">Utah Jazz</font> VS <font color="red">Houston Rockets</font></div> When: Sunday February 27th, 4:00 PM (EST)/ 3:00PM (CT) Where: Houston, Toyota Center Local TV: FSN <div align="center">Predicted Starters <font color="purple">Jazz</font> <font size="1"><font face="Arial"><font color="purple">Keith McLeod, Raja Bell, Matt Harpring, Andrei Kirilenko, Jarron Collins</font></font></font></div> <div align="center"><font color="red">Rockets</font> <font size="1"><font face="Arial"><font color="red">Mike James, David Wesley, Tracy McGrady, Juwan Howard, Yao Ming</font></font></font></div> Keys to The Game For Utah <ul> [*]Defense. The Rockets have been an outstanding offensive team of late, especially at home. Jon Barry, David Wesley, Scott Padgett and Mike James are all expert three point shooters, so the Jazz would have to guard the perimeter with caution. Kirilenko will also have to do a good job on McGrady. [*]Everyone does his part. In the absence of Carlos Boozer, the Jazz are without their leading scorer and rebounder. Andrei Kirilenko has stepped up admiringly on the offensive end, but he cannot be the only one scoring for Utah. Harpring, Okur, Giricek, and almost everyone else will have to chip in. [*] [/list] Keys To The Game For Houston <ul> [*]Gel as a team. Mike James, Vin Baker and Moochie Norris are all making their first Rocket appearances this season since being acquired in deals on Thursday. James will start, while Norris and Baker will also likely play considerable minutes. They will need to know their teammates' tendencies well in order for Houston to be victorious. [*]Yao/McGrady come up big. The duo of Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady always determine the outcome of games. Yao has been on a tear lately and he should go for 25 and 10. If McGrady can come out of his shooting slump, they can combine for 50 and 20, and the Rockets should have an easy time. [*]Ride Toyota Center. The Rockets, Yao in particular, play better on their home floor in Houston, and that advantage will have to be maximized for us to be successful. The Jazz are woeful on the road and Houston will have to take advantage of that. [/list] Game Outlook The Rockets have lost to two top-tier teams in Seattle and San Antonio since returning from the All-Star break on an eight-game winning streak. However, there were very optimistic signs. Even with floor leader and top point guard Bob Sura injured and avaliable, the Rockets were able to stay close in both games all while being at a disadvantage at point guard. With new additions Mike James and Moochie Norris, that position should be strongly fortified for tomorrow. This game won't be hard for Houston to win. Prediction Rockets-109 Jazz-95
I don't know, because Kirilenko can blindside Yao with weakside help. Hopefully Juwan is having a good game early so Kirilenko will stay honest.
do you guys know what channel it will come on because the only channel i saw it was going ot be on was a spanish channel and i really hope i dont have to watch it in spanish
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting cheen0:</div><div class="quote_post">do you guys know what channel it will come on because the only channel i saw it was going ot be on was a spanish channel and i really hope i dont have to watch it in spanish</div> Local: FSNSW National: NBATV , Telemundo
Rockets vs Jazz right now, hopefully we can end our 2 game losing streak, this being the first games of the players we aquired before the deadline I hope they make a good first impression!
We haven't seen Baker yet, but neither James nor Moochie are impressing. They combine for 2 points, 2 rebounds and one assist in 14 minutes combined. Inconclusive...
Another brickfest. I really don't know how in the world Houston is in this game at the halftime but well- we are. The new players aren't really impressing while Yao is having bad game. He's having trouble with fouls again and his shooting isn't really impressing. That goes for all role players as well. Wesley, Barry, and Mutumbo seem to be having an off game- so they need to step it up in the second half. McGrady on the other hand seems to be getting out of his shooting slump and is knocking down some open jumpers but he has to continue that if he wants to win this game. Good Luck Houston in the second half.
You shouldn't have expected ANYTHING impressive from Moochie. The guy is a 3-4 ppg scorer the last 3 years. With James, I guess you were expecting him to dominate the game or something. Even by halftime he was showing his potential, and obviously by the end of the game he had made a huge impact. 8-16 overall 3-8 from three 2-2 from the line Aside from a few turnovers (can be expected in his first game with a new team), what more did you guys want? I mean, even before he got going offensively, he was doing a bang up job on D, showed his quickness when penetrating, and his passes were quick and crisp.
James didnt know how to play with Yao, there were times where he should have deferred, but he didnt. We need bobby sura back.
I disagree that James didn't know how to play with Yao. Yao was just having a ton of trouble with the Jazz defense pounding him down low and couldn't get any kind of rhythm going. There were plenty of times during the game when James was on the bench, or was not the primary ball handler, and Yao wasn't getting anything going during those times either. The bottom line is that Yao was playing weak today, and Mike has nothing to do with that. I mean, when he got the ball in the post he turned it over 3 times, and he only pulled down 4 rebounds, 1 of which was offensive. If he doesn't turn the ball over, and pulls down a couple more offensive boards by playing aggressively, that's 5 more shot attempts right there, and probably 5-7 more points. You have to look at the fact that Mike got 3 steals as well, so although he had 4 turnovers, he pretty much erased 3 by getting them back on the defensive end. That leaves him with 3 assists and 1 turnover which is a great ratio, and even then one of his turnovers was a pass that Jon Barry should have caught. All things considered, I give Mike James an A- in his debut, and I can't wait to see what we get out of him once he gets acclimated into the system.
I don't like how James played last night, even though he did put up some nice stats. Down the stretch when we were down by 10 and were trying to make the last charge, James took two straight outside jumpers, when he would have been much better served passing the ball to McGrady, Yao, or even Barry. Wesley had a great game, but the Jazz simply got hot down the stretch and killed us with outside shooting, first Bell, then Harpring. Yao was too passive on offense, he went for a layup and missed when a dunk was a much better option. He needs to be aggressive, but there were quite a few times when he had good post position and we swung the ball the other way to go to T-Mac. The Jazz big men were all capable shooters and dragged Yao out to the perimeter, which made penetration easier for them.
We cant loose to a team that had previously only won 1 game on the road this year. James had a good offensive night but i dont know about the D cause raja bell was great. yao could have done much better. i saw a picture in the paper of Okur taking a rebound right out of yaos face. He looks like he has ball fright or something. And this is all the time. Everyone says sura ignores yao so you cant really blame it on james. Yao really is being a dissapointment with his inconsistency.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting bplld:</div><div class="quote_post">We cant loose to a team that had previously only won 1 game on the road this year.</div> The Jazz have won 7 road games...
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting bplld:</div><div class="quote_post">I said this this year, which means the last two months</div> Ahh, sneaky. You know that everyone says "year" when they mean season :-o Either way, it's a misleading statistic. I mean, Boston is doing well this season and they had only won 4 road games in '05 going into Sunday...and one of them was at Charlotte.
