<div align="center"></div> <div align="center"><font color="red">Houston Rockets</font> VS <font color="green">Seattle Supersonics</font></div> When: Tuesday March 8th, 10:00 PM (EST)/ 9:00PM (CT) Where: Seattle, Key Arena Local TV: FSN, NBA TV <div align="center">Predicted Starters <font color="green">Sonics</font> <font size="1"><font face="Arial"><font color="green">Luke Ridnour, Ray Allen, Rashard Lewis, Reggie Evans, Jerome James</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 Seattle <ul> [*]Hot Hands. Seattle has a great three-point shooting team, with players like Allen, Lewis, Radmanovic and Ridnour who could all shoot the lights out from downtown. However, if their hands are cold tonight and shoot very badly from three like they did against Phoenix, their overall game would suffer. [*]Hustle. The Seattle team beat Houston in the Toyota Center two weeks ago thanks to excellent hustle from Reggie Evans and Jerome James. They enjoyed a big lead on the offensive boards, and it became easy for the team to get second and third chances. Sure wouldn't mind a few extra chances this time too. [*]Swing the ball. The Rockets are a fairly good defensive team, but their perimeter defense has loopholes since double-teaming is a very often used tatic. If the Sonics can swing the ball around the wing and find the open man, they'd be in for an easy night. [/list] Keys To The Game For Houston <ul> [*]Defense. The Sonics are a good offensive team, and the Rockets will have to work to make sure they don't go over 100. Holding Dallas to 69 points must have been a confidence booster, so let's hope that the Rockets are more confident and able on defense. [*]Yao/McGrady come up big. Don't they always have to come up big? [*]Rebound. The Sonics killed Houston last time around by grabbing a huge number of offensive rebounds. The Rockets will need to box out this game and hope that Evans and Fortson won't help Seattle get too many second chances. [/list] Prediction Rockets-109 Sonics-104
Nice preview Trip. I hope the Rockets will match the intensity of the Sonic guards tonight now that they have Mike James. James provides speed in the backcourt, defensive intensity as well as additional perimeter shooting which Strickland and Barrett failed to do so the last time around. Ray Allen is still the man to guard as he have height advantage against either Wesley or James. He beat Wesley last time on the one on one low post game. Allen didn't even jump much when he shoots over Wesley. TMac can handle well R.Lewis. The most important keys to game is to limit Sonics' offensive rebounding. They might be off in their shooting especially with the tight defense but they always know where to grab the rebounds for a second and third chance put back. Yao must be aggresive tonight in getting the boards. If he can foul out James,Evans and Fortson that would be great. Seattle has no antidote for Yao so the Rockets must take advantage of it. I hope the Rockets will be able to pull this one. How we wish that there will be a good officiating game tonight.
key - stopping the 3 ball... rocket must close out on 3's faster because they love to bomb the 3 key - holding onto a lead, the sonics can come back quick because of the 3 key - Yao in the post, he needs to be more assertive against Seattle's smaller big men key - guarding their quicker, outside shooting 4's, ie. Radmanovic and sometimes Rashard Lewis when the Sonics go with their smaller lineup.
Jerome James: <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">"I can't stop Yao, but he doesn't know it," James said. "As long as he doesn't know it, I'm going to use it to my advantage, use my experience to my advantage. ? What I know defensively with six years in the league, he can't combat it with his three years in the league offensively."</div> -SuperSonics.com Yao needs to be aggressive tonight. James said it himself, he cant stop Yao. So if Yao can get into a rythm early he should have a great game.
Don't the Rockets struggle against the Sonics? Now playing at Seattle, I think the Sonics will this game. I'm saying Seattle by a final score of 108-100.
The key to this game will really be rebounding. Last meeting, we didnt have sura and they didnt have fortson(i think we should try to aquire him)who is back now, both key rebounders for their teams but the sonics still dominated us on the boards and was the key reason they pulled away. If we want to win, we really have to step up in that category. The sonics cant handle yao, so we should try to feed him the ball a whole lot. A 30 point game would be good, but i wood like to see one around 40.
Nice preview. This should definitely be a good game- the last time these two teams played, it ended up going right down to the wire. However, this time Seattle has Danny Fortson back while Sura is still recovering from his injury. That just gives more reason for Houston to play harder and hustle. I can't stress this enough, Houston has got to outrebound Seattle. Since Seattle is such a good shooting team, Houston has to take advantage when they do miss, because the next time they shoot it, they'll make it. I hope the role players step it up for this one and for both stars to shine. Lewis has got nothing on McGrady while the Seattle inner defense can't handle Yao so there's really no reason why these guys can't play well. In addition to that, I hope Mike James gets another good shooting night but also involves his teammates more since that might be the key to our win. Prediction- Houston win, 104-102.
well if yao cant get the boards right off the bat mutumbo does a better job so we actually have another option if yao isnt getting them.
This time we don't have Sura, but we do have Mike James. Luke Ridnour might find it hard to stop him so don't be surprised if Mike goes for 25. I'd like to see Van Gundy play Weatherspoon more this game to counter Evans's rebounding.
Rockets 86 Sonics 83... ...with 1.40 left in the game This is aonther going down to the wire. I'm surprised that Mike James hasn't exploded all over Ridnour. only 10 pts and 4 assists. Once again T-Mac shows up with 30 pts and Yao is doing ok with 18 pts/ I wonder if NBA courtside live has updated the stats yet?
hoooray!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We won!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!! I don't have time to write, getta go to school now, but this saved my day! and we beat the Sonics!
Yupz thats right, we won. The score was 97 - 95. TALK ABOUT CLOSE!!!! T-Mac had 35 points for us and Allen had 32 for the Sonics. Yao chipped in 22 points in another weak rebounding effort (4 rebs). Fortson did not play well (statisically) and didn't have many minutes and Evans had 8 rebounds, so I guess that our ability to limit the rebounding beasts helpped us with the win. Just another reminder, WE BEAT THE SONICS WITHOUT SURA!!! Our performance after the break may have been dismal, but we did lose all (except the wiz game) in close battles. I think that is very promising since we haven't had Sura since the break. If Sura stays healthy when he comes back, we have a legit run in the playoffs. We should match up to Sonics and Phoenix well with good defense. And we have been known to come up with Victories against the mighty Spurs. I'm still not sure how we would do against a healthy Mavs team though.
great game by the rockets, 16 point comeback and 6 points in the 3rd. It again came down to the wire and the rockets got to take this one. We showed we really are a good road team and hopefully we can take this into the game against pheonix and sacto. Id like for us to keep this spot now that i see we really put up a great fight against this team and actually could be better than them.
Hell yeah! I was at school but buzter told me we won and I was goin crazy! this was awesome! great game by T-Mac! went down to the wire but who cares WE WON! Final Score 97-95 (we only let them score 6 points in the third )
Rockets 97 // Sonics 95 Great win by the Rockets though a little bit scary one in the last few seconds when TMac missed both FTs to seal the game giving the Sonics a chance for another 3 pt shot. Good thing they missed and Mike James calmly sank his FTs to seal the game right in time when Ray Allen finally sank a useless 3. Great defense by the Rockets forcing the Sonics to score just 6 points in the whole 3rd quarter while limiting their offensive rebounds. They also stole the ball 14 times compared to the Sonic's 6. Yao didn't rebound well but take note he has 3 steals. Good scoring game by our 2 All Stars. Yao put his will into the game. I hope they can continue to play well against the Suns especially they have Sura back in the next game.
Good effort by the Rockets in the second half. I thought that Wesley, James, and McGrady played superb on-the-ball defense in the third quarter. When they're really focused, the Rockets are a excellent perimeter defensive team -- definitely light years ahead of where they were to start the season. Yao Ming and McGrady took charge in the fourth quarter, like you would want. But, man, Ray Allen had a hell of a ball game. It wasn't just the shooting, he was making so many hustle plays. He almost had the play of the game in the last minute when he ran down an offensive board and the threw back over his head while falling out of bounds. Didn't he also run down a loose ball down the stretch when the Sonics won in Houston? I'm really not sure who to keep out of the starting lineup when Sura returns. Even though Mike James sometimes dribbles the ball too much, you could have said the same about Sura his first few weeks with the team. James has been rebounding the ball pretty well the last few games (over 6 a game), and he's a better scorer and defender. I think Sura should come off the bench for at least a few games and we'll see how it goes.
Yeah must have been the defensive stops we had in the 3rd quarter where Sonics only scored 6 points!! Must've been a great quarter to watch..for us lol. Yao's been playing well the past 2 games; I hope it's because of JVG's approach of keeping him on the floor longer regardless of fouls. What's funny is that he hasn't gotten into any foul trouble the past 2 games and today he's played 30+ minutes which is what we need from him every game. His production has been great when he plays 30 minutes+
blueracer, Tracy did not miss 2 free throws at the end of the game. He was fouled but still managed to make the basket, so he got 2 points and just one free throw, which he missed. So, it was the equivalent of him missing the shot because of the foul and then sinking 2 free throws. durvasa, I couldn't disagree more about benching Sura. You know they say "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" and we won those 8 games in a row with Sura in the starting lineup. I say leave things the way they were when we were winning.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Sniper:</div><div class="quote_post">blueracer, Tracy did not miss 2 free throws at the end of the game. He was fouled but still managed to make the basket, so he got 2 points and just one free throw, which he missed. So, it was the equivalent of him missing the shot because of the foul and then sinking 2 free throws. durvasa, I couldn't disagree more about benching Sura. You know they say "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" and we won those 8 games in a row with Sura in the starting lineup. I say leave things the way they were when we were winning.</div> Yeah, but we've played well the last two games with Mike James starting. And who knows what Sura's condition really is. It might be a good idea to scale back his minutes some, and bring him off the bench as a combo guard. It 'll be interesting to see what JVG does.
