Shooting touch resurfaces at start, finish
20 3-pointers are a welcome return to more typical form
CHICAGO — Rockets forward Ryan Anderson headed toward the bench, his 3-pointer having opened a 15-point fourthquarter lead and led Bulls coach Fred Hoiberg to a timeout, when he reached out his hands and shouted to teammates Trevor Ariza and P.J. Tucker, “I made one! I made one!” Uncharacteristic as that might have been, his mini- celebration spoke to more than just his shooting touch.
The Rockets needed their 116-107 win over the Chicago Bulls on Monday night for the way they got it nearly as much as because they needed any win they can find as they regroup while waiting for reinforcements to arrive from the training room.
The Rockets needed to win
their way. They needed to defend well. They needed to respond when a team made a move with poise they lacked in Detroit. Mostly, they needed to pour in 3-pointers the way they did when the offense was clicking at its best.
They also might have needed to enjoy themselves a bit.
“It’s fun to be in a position to take a 3, make a 3 and be able to laugh about it,” Anderson said. “It’s not like we were up two
points. We played great defense down the stretch. We definitely needed a game like this and just to have fun playing again.”
The Rockets relished a night in which they started and finished the game defending as they rarely had in weeks. But they also rode waves of 3-point shooting to lead by 21 in the first quarter, and after letting all of that lead slip away to trail by three, to build the lead back to 19 in the fourth.
Just like old times
They made 20 of their 54 3-pointers, their fifth game this season with at least 20 treys, but their first since Nov. 27. They had 10 games with at least 20 3-pointers last season after hitting so many in a game just twice in the rest of franchise history.
“We’re just trying to win games,” Rockets guard Chris Paul said. “That’s the way we play. Get up and down. If a guy has an open shot, take it.
“I’ve never seen anything like that. And I’m just now getting into that mode. It’s fun. I get to get on guys about not taking shots. Trevor passed up a shot in the first half and I went nuts on him. Coach is like that on all of us. He says, ‘the first good shot that you get, take it.’ A cool way to play.”
The Rockets also set one of the few 3-point records they did not have, hitting at least 10 3-pointers for the 35th consecutive game, having fallen short of double digits just once this season. (The Bulls set a franchise record with their seventh straight game with 10 3-pointers).
Just making 10 in a game for the Rockets would be considered unacceptable. Even Saturday, when they lamented the long stretches when they misfired, they hit 15.
But Monday when the Bulls made their move, the Rockets responded with more poise and intensity. They tightened their defense. They took good shots. They mixed in the now-customary 22 points off the bench from Gerald Green, this time with a pair of drives to slams to remind of his dunk championship glory.
Between the Bulls’ three-point lead and the Rockets’ surge to a 19-point lead, the Bulls made 12 of 31 shots, all while the Rockets happily fired away.
Defense first mentality
“We did pick up our intensity defensively,” coach Mike D’Antoni said. “There are going to be swings, but first we need to withstand it and, two, we need to understand the defensive end is the way to keep it up, not always on the offensive end.
“Defensively, we gave up some points at the end, but we were much better tonight.”
The Rockets did have their stretch of misfiring. They made 2 of their next 19 attempts from the 3-point line after taking their largest lead. But they kept getting good looks, kept firing away and eventually kept scoring to pull safely away again
“That’s the way we play,” Ariza said. “For us to win, we have to not second-guess what we do. Any time we play our style of basketball, that gives us the best chance to win. That’s what we do. We just have to stay true to it.”