Houston Rockets at Golden State Warriors @ This game will be on April 5th, at the Oakland Arena in Oakland on NBA TV at 10:30 pm. Starting Lineups <font color="DarkRed">Houston Rockets</font> <font color="DarkRed">Bob Sura, David Wesley, Tracy McGrady, Clarence Weatherspoon, Yao Ming</font> <font color="Navy">Golden State Warriors</font> <font color="Navy">Derek Fisher, Jason Richardson, Mike Dunleavy, Troy Murphy, Adonal Foyle</font> Keys to the Game - Yao and McGrady come up big for Houston. Whenever that happens, Houston usually comes up with the big win. Plus, I don't think anyone on Golden State can even match up with them and hold them defensively so they probably are going to put up some nice points this game. - Role player points. Over the past few games, the bench points and role player points have really took a dive and it shows through the last two losses. Plus, Jon Barry might even be sitting out for this one so Wesley, James, and Sura all have to make up for him. If they can come up big in this game, Houston will have an easier night. Also, keep your eyes out for those three to be exploding tonight since there really hasn't be anything going for them in the last two games. - Play aggressively. Sure it may be a sub .500 team, but that doesn't give any excuse for Houston to not hustle and play agressively for this one. In fact, they are actually pretty hot right now. Houston still has to play stellar defense and try to out rebound Golden State if they want to win this one. Remember, never keep the guard down since they gave us a scare last time. - Watch the perimeter. With the trio of Wesley and James, Houston is now a great perimeter shooting team so Golden State better watch out for these guys. If they ever want to double team, they really need to keep an eye out for these guys or else they will make Golden State pay. - Everyone steps up. Everyone needs to score including the bench players and if that happens, Golden State may give Houston a run for their money. Also, they should try and run the offense through Jason Richardson and probably Baron Davis since those are their key players and make their offense flow much more fluidly. - Jason Richardson and Baron Davis come up big. Since they are probably the only legit players that can outmatch their counterparts (not sure about Davis beating James though) these guys really need to make a difference. They have to player top notch offense and try to drive to the hole to convert easy buckets. Prediction - 101 - 95
I don't know if Houston can come up with the W at Golden State. The Warriors are a whole different team and have been tearing up the league. I think Houston will lose this one in the Arena in Oakland. At the very least if they come out victorious, I see the game going down to the wire.
I agree with you mrj18. Our chances against the Warriors are 50-50. The Warriors are playing on their free spirit right now. They have nothing to lose and it challenges them to play as spoilers for the playoff bound teams. They are also very young and athletic. It's hard to defend a team with big men hitting ouside shots. The Rockets are playing with injuries to some players and they are not good enough in overcoming those things compared to the Nuggets,Mavs, Grizzlies and Kings who played the year having lost their key players for a while but still manage to win games. Right now now the Rockets are without Barry(back) and Howard(knee). If we can do the same thing the last time that we play them wherein we took Davis, Fisher and Richardson out of their game we do have a chance but let's not take for granted that we still have Dunleavy,Murphy,Pietrus and Cabarkapa to defend. Good shooting percentage will bring back the Rockets in this game. With Yao and TMac slightly injured Sura must play his best against his former team. I hope James and Padgett will regain their shooting touch also and for Bowen to play like he did last sunday. If the Rockets will win it will be a close one otherwise there will be a chance that we will be blown out again if the bad shooting continues. This will be an important game as a win tonight will boost the morale of the Rockets.
Does anyone know if Yao is playing this game after his injuries in the Phoenix game? If Yao does play, we should come out victorious. Last time out, the Rockets couldn't stop the energetic play of Pietrus and Carbakapa, but I always have confidence with our team. If Derek Fisher can continue throwing up wild threes, Golden State might not have a chance. Sure, they might be 8-2 in their last 10, and we have no one to guard Murphy blah blah blah, but the Rockets have a lot more at stake and they most certainly shouldn't pass up on an opportunity to get one game closer to clinching a playoff spot.
Trip I think Yao will play tonight. Keith Jones said that Yao and TMac will be fine despite their minor injuries and they can play for tonight. Barry is the one who miss tonight's game and will be back probably against the Lakers this coming thursday.
Well, we lost to the hornets and the warriors are 8-2 the last ten games(looks like the trade worked out well) but the rockets should be able to pull this away. We are on a tough road trip right now so hopefully we can get something going. We have to step it up at the arc. Offense is sucking right now chance to put it back together here. rockets blowout-102-83
The only way I see the Rockets losing is if they have another bad shooting night. In the last 9 games Golden State has been playing very well but they havnt played a top 10 defensive team since they last played the Rockets. I think if Houston wants to come out victorious they will need 3 things tonight: -Good ball movement -Energy -SHOOTING!
Third straight loss by the Rockets. Although we loss the ball game we shot the ball well and made our FTs flawlessly. That's the only positive thing that the Rockets have tonight. TMac matched up well with Baron Davis but we lost the ballgame by giving up too many "shooting" foul that the Warriors made 33 of them easily embarassing our 19-19 FT shooting. Fouls committed between 2 teams are almost identical with the Rockets having two more fouls. The Warriors are just agressive offensively. It's no surprise that we lost this game. The Warriors are just so hot these days. Next game against the Lakers is a must win for the Rockets. The Lakers will be without Kobe, Odom and Mihm. If we became complacent again and lose to the Lakers it will be a big let down for us. We might be caught up in the same situation like the Twolves who needs to win at least all of their remaining games to get into the playoffs. The rockets must wake up. No need to give an off day for starters or key players this time. The season is almost over and they have to make most out of it to stay in contention. It cost the Rockets a loss last friday against the Hornets. Yao could have played and it's only a minor injury even Duncan and KG would play the game. The Rockets must respect their opponents especially the last games against the Laker,Clippers and struggling Sonics. These are the only games that we have good chances of winning as well as to reach 48 wins that as of now would qualify us at least for a playoff spot.
Whats happening to Wesley?? Why in the world is he playing so poorly?? No embarassment in this loss though, the Warriors are really surging and I think they can make some noise next season. Speaking of the Lakers, is Kobe injured again? So if they're without their 3 starters, there is no excuse to not win this game.
I don't understand.. are we tanking it all of a sudden? are we not playing well? or are the teams we're playing just been better than us? Tonights game was dissapointing, I was proud that T-Mac scored 44 points and Yao had a decent statline of 23-11 and Sura added 15 but everyone else was pretty bad, like Eduardo said, what is happenin to Wesley!? 3/13 tonight? We really need Juwan Howard back, I didn't think he was that big of a part of this team and was replacable easily by Weatherspoon, but obviously we really do need him, especially for the upcoming playoffs, he'll be a big piece our puzzle..
Man, this is bad. I didn't watch the game, but I can tell the Warriors were just more aggressive offensively. They were trying to get to the basket more and it's obvious with all the shooting fouls we had on them. Meanwhile, we were just settling for the jumpers even when they weren't really going in. The only bright spot that I see in this game is that many of the players have gotten out of their shooting slump except for Wesley, and that McGrady and Yao both had great games. Otherwise, the Warriors just played harder. Plus, we didn't even step it up on the defensive end to try and stop them from getting so many points. Bottom line, Rockets really need to get it together for the rest of this road trip or else they will either lose the playoff spot, get the seventh or eighth seed, or be very weak in the playoffs.
Disappointing game. I'm proud of the Rockets' offensive showing, but angry and sad at our defense. Giving up 122 points will simply not win us games. Just like last time these teams met, the Warriors were very aggressive and drew fouls. This time they drew even more fouls than last time. Wesley's definitely not himself lately. We're at a crossroads with him. If we tell him to take less shots if he's going to miss anyways, but if he doesn't shoot much, he might not get his touch back in time for the playoffs.
He wasn't very effective either..he was in the game for a whopping 40 mins and he shot 3/13, had 2 assts and a couple of turnovers. A few weeks ago, 40 mins would have meant at least 15 points for him. To be honest, I think Wesley was the main reason we lost that game. He's our defensive man and he usually sets the tone for defense. He didn't do well on BD and he couldn't hit his open shots when we needed it. There were times that we were within two or three points but whenever we had the chance by throwing the ball to an open Wesley, he just couldn't hit! IMO he really needs to practice like T-mac did when he was in a slump.
