Harden has 37 points; Rockets rout OKC Thunder, Westbrook

HOUSTON — James Harden scored 37 points to outshine Russell Westbrook and the Houston Rockets pulled away in the third quarter and coasted to a 118-87 victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder on Sunday night in Game 1 of their first-round playoff series.

The best-of-seven Western Conference series continues Wednesday night in Houston.

The third-seeded Rockets were up by 20 when Harden came off the bench with about seven minutes remaining. He went right to work — making two 3-pointers to power a 10-0 run and push the lead to 110-80 with 4½ minutes left. Harden, who along with Westbrook is a front-runner for MVP, went to the bench after that and both teams cleared their benches soon after that.

Westbrook had 22 points, 11 rebounds and seven assists, but made just six of 23 shots and had nine turnovers for the sixth-seeded Thunder.

Harden also had nine assists and seven rebounds, and Patrick Beverley had a playoff career-best 21 points along with 10 rebounds for the Rockets.

The Thunder trailed by 15 entering the fourth quarter and six straight points by the Rockets extended their lead to 100-78 with about 7½ minutes remaining. Lou Williams scored the first four points in that span, and Beverley found Clint Capela on an alley-oop dunk.

The Rockets scored the first five points of the second half to push their lead to 10 points early in the third quarter. After a timeout, Oklahoma City scored the next eight points with 3s from Westbrook and Andre Roberson to cut it to 64-62 with about 8½ minutes left in the quarter.

Houston scored the next nine points, capped by consecutive 3-pointers by Beverley to make it 7364 midway through the period.