Scoring isn’t issue
Rockets are confident strong offense will lead way.
The Rockets expected the offense to be special. They would run, shoot 3s and put up big numbers. That much was certain.
It is what they were built to do. And if they didn’t, they would be in all kinds of trouble, 41-41 levels of trouble, to start the season.
They just did not know it would happen this soon.
The Rockets clicked quickly, finishing the preseason as the NBA’s top offensive team, even with the leg-draining trip to China and blowing off the final game of the preseason to let four starters stay home.
Scoreboard will get workout
Less certain is whether a prolific offense will be enough, as the Rockets spent their final practices before Wednesday’s season opener at the Lakers working on the defense.
But for now, they had reason to believe the offense will be so strong the defense need only to be good enough.
“We have the ability to score the ball,” forward Ryan Anderson said. “It’s no surprise to anybody. This preseason proved it. It’s good to show that coach (Mike) D’Antoni’s offense really does work with our group. There were games we weren’t even shooting the ball very well and we still got 120 points. That’s a good sign for us.
“It would be great for us to score like that. Obviously, we need to defend on the other end and that will make us a great team. If we can score, we’ll be real good.”
The Rockers were second to the Warriors in net rating (the difference per 100 possessions in the number of points a team scores and allows) in the preseason, ranking first offensively and 15th defensively.
Though the preseason proves little, given the small sample size of just six games against NBA teams among other things, it might indicate a chance for the offense to be prolific enough if the defense improves.
“I think you have to be top five (offensively) and top 10 in both categories to be really good,” D’Antoni said. “We’re going to try to do that. Obviously, we have a better chance to be No. 1 on offense. There’s no reason we can’t be that.”
A great offensive team will nearly without fail find itself at the top of the standings. Teams ranked in the top five offensively have averaged 57.2 wins in the past four seasons. No team in the top five in offensive rating in the past 10 seasons has failed to surpass the Rockets’ 41-41 record of last season.
Basketball is a two-way game
To go beyond that to be a championship contender has of course required at least some degree of excellence on both ends of the floor. Of the past 10 champions, eight were in the top five in net rating and all 10 were among the top 10.
Still, the Rockets’ offense has come around quickly enough to create optimism for the start of the season, even about the defense.
“Obviously, we know we can score the ball extremely well,” guard James Harden said. “I think, as the season goes on, we’ll get more comfortable with each other and it will look a lot better. The only thing we’re really focused on is defensively getting stops,
because we can score. If we get stops, the offense will become a lot easier.”
They can improve their defense just by upgrading on the other end.
Last season, when the Rockets were ranked 20th in the NBA in points allowed per possession, they were 28th in points allowed off turnovers and ranked 25th in defensive rating following missed shots.
If they can better take care of and shoot the ball, they can improve
greatly defensively just by improving offensively.
“No question, our half-court defense is great,” Anderson said. “We’re guarding the ball real well when teams bring the ball up. In transition, that’s our big thing we have to work on. We have to get better at that.”
Limiting turnovers could come as result of tweaks in the offense to provide much better spacing and dramatically cut down on the closequarters passes in the lane that led to Harden setting a record for turnovers. He led the NBA with an average of 10.7 assists in the preseason but committed an average of five turnovers.
Harden gets everyone involved
Still, D’Antoni has built his offense around Harden, calling him “one of the best pick-and-roll guys that I’ve seen” and the key to the Rockets’ high-scoring preseason.
“It’s way ahead of what I thought, but that’s because James is so good at what he does,” D’Antoni said. “He’s got everybody involved and we have good shooters. There’s a lot of stuff we need to get a lot better on. Right now, it’s preseason. I’ll take it with a grain of salt.”
But they have done what they expected, believing that can lead to what they hope will come when the numbers start to count.