<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>Styles make fights in boxing. In basketball, they usually end them. And the Hawks' undersized but scrappy approach was absolutely no match for the Houston Rockets' brute force Saturday night. As a result, the Hawks found themselves on the floor early and often as the Rockets, playing with the NBA's largest player — 7-foot-6, 310-pound center Yao Ming — laid waste to the Hawks' interior defense in a 108-89 rout before a sellout crowd of 18,177 at Toyota Center. It was the second straight humbling loss for the Hawks, who dropped to 21-26 for the season and a feeble 6-16 on the road. They lost 100-95 to Cleveland on Friday at Philips Arena, rallying from an early deficit to take a late lead only to lose their way with five turnovers in the final three minutes. So thorough was the Rockets' domination of the Hawks that the second half of the game was merely an official conclusion to a game that ended roughly five minutes before halftime. The Hawks set or tied season lows for first-half points (31), points in a quarter (10 in the second) and field-goal percentage (.174, 4-for-23) by a Rockets opponent. "We should have just stayed at the hotel the way we played," Hawks coach Mike Woodson said. "Our energy level early on was just non-existent."</div> Source: AJC
