Rockets: Run- and- gun offense starts with sound defense.
Rockets coach Kevin McHale had heard the theory many times.
There had to be truth to support the idea that teams that run and score in bunches necessarily lack themindset of slow- down, defensiveminded teams. It nevermade sense.
“I never truly understood that,” McHale said of his efforts to disprove the theory. “People always say that. You can’t score if you don’t have the ball, so I never understood that.
“When you have the ball, then you play offense. When you don’t have the ball, you play defense.”
That much is beyond dispute, as is the understanding that for the Rockets to have any success, theymust become an exception to the rule.
They must run. Lacking half- court, one- onone players, they hope to make up the difference with an up- tempo, fast break- filled offense. But that will not be enough unless they can stop teams on the other end far more consistently than they had in the first four preseason games.
“Our ability to score the ball on a consistent basis will come in time,” forward Patrick Patterson said. “For us to have success, for us to win games, for us to go into hostile environments and perform well, we’ll have to be defensively sound.”
Rapid pace
They have a chance. In the preseason, they have allowed 104 points per game, the most in the NBA. Some of that is because of the pace at which they play, creating more possessions.
Even when adjusted for pace, the Rockets have surrendered points easily.
But they also have shown signs of being a much better defensive team than the numbers indicate or than they have been in recent seasons.
Going back to his introductory news conference, McHale has said his top priority is to defend the paint. According to the team’s calculations, the Rockets’ half- court interior defense in the preseason has been among the top half of the league and the second best in the NBA when center Omer Asik is on the floor.
Asik and Patterson are considered top- level pickandroll defenders, giving the Rockets a chance to excel at half- court defense, especially late in games. The problem in the preseason has been shoddy transition defense. Even if the Rockets got back, they often just went along for the ride, unable tomatch up and interfere with the break.
Transition game
“We’ve had our moments; preseason games we’ve done great in transition defense,” Patterson said. “The Dallas game we got killed. We have to get out and run. But also, we have to get back in transition defense. That’s a focus we’ve had every single day in practice.”
The Rockets insist achieving a defensive mentality won’t be a problem, even while they look to push the tempo. But teams that run often face teams running against them.
It won’t be enough to excel at half- court defense if they cannot play halfcourt defense.
“Omer, Patrick and Chandler ( Parsons) can be very good defensively up front for us,” McHale said. “If you don’t have good court balance, good transition, guys don’t do their assignment on the offensive end, you’ll never get to half- court defense. They’ll lay it in at some point before you get in there.
“I would say right now, players had to take the court together, McHale collected the team for a post- practice talk.
“We have to put a value on practice and getting better,” McHale said.” I’ve never seen an NBA team, a young team especially, not practice well and then in the game do everything perfectly. Usually, you do everything in practice and then have a bunch of slippage. If we have slippage from today, oof, I can’t imagine what that would look like.”