Zhou misses out on fun night
Knee injury costs center a chance to play extended minutes against Chinese team
For most of the Rockets, there was never going to be much to gain from 48 minutes sharing the court with the Shanghai Sharks on Tuesday night. They could shoot some 3-pointers and then keep on shooting them until the numbers looked like misprints even by their standards and they would win in a certain blowout. But mostly, they would get one day closer to a real regular-season dress rehearsal on Friday.
For Zhou Qi, the night could offer playing time and a fun coincidence of timing.
The rest of the Rockets, save the eight held out with injuries or for rest, had their night of target practice along the way to the expected romp past the Sharks, with the Rockets leading by 51 before finishing off a perfunctory 128-86 rout.
Zhou, however, had not played in the preseason, slowed by an offseason sprained ankle and caught in the Rockets’ glut of centers. For him, the game could have been something more.
With an old Chinese Basketball Association rival in town and the Rockets sitting almost every teammate that could be considered tall, Zhou would have playing time and even a bit of a showcase for those watching the streaming of the game back
home.
He played 3½ minutes before he was caught under former Rockets forward Luis Scola and left with a sprained left knee. Zhou was taken from the floor in a wheelchair in obvious pain, costing him a change to join the fun the Rockets had without him and likely time to work his way into the mix behind Clint Capela at center.
“I think it’s just a sprain,” Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni said. “That’s what they said. He’ll get an MRI and see if there’s anything new, but thank goodness it’s just a sprain.”
Without the option to encase everyone else in bubble wrap, D’Antoni watched James Harden and P.J. Tucker lead a 3-for-all beyond any even the Rockets have shown before. As if the one thing that could be gained from the endeavor would be to hone their shooting rhythm, the Rockets put up 66 3-pointers, hitting 28, to take and make more 3s than any team ever has in an actual NBA game.
“For sure, playing basketball is playing basketball no matter who you’re playing,” said Tucker, who started at center with Capela, Isaiah Hartenstein, Marquese Chriss and Nene all out. “We told guys before the start of the game, all the young guys, we’re going to come out like we’re playing … the best team in the NBA. We just go out and play.”
Harden, who had made 34.5 percent of his 3-pointers in the Rockets’ first three preseason game, ended his night with a side-step 3 with a behind-theback move to beat the buzzer at the end of the third quarter. That gave him 37 points on 13-of-18 shooting, 9 of 14 from behind the 3-point line to match as many 3s as he has ever hit in a regularseason game.
Tucker had 22, making 6 of 11 3s and in his two preseason games has made 53.6 percent of his shots. James Ennis III added 15 in his 25 minutes and has made 56.7 percent of his attempts in the preseason.
Rookie Gary Clark, who started the second half after Chris Paul exited with nine points and nine assists, had 16 points on 5-of-7 shooting, making 4 of 6 3s (plus another that was taken away after a review) to continue his impressive preseason.
“We manufacture 3s and that’s good, regardless of who you’re playing against,” D’Antonio said. “Just to be able to get up 66 3s, at least we are playing the right way. It won’t always be that way, but we want to play a certain way and that’s what we’re going to do.”
For a preseason workout, that was enough, before Gerald Green and the Vipers-to-be took care of the fourth quarter. But for Zhou, it was a night that could have been more, only to have a tough preseason get tougher, even in the easiest of Rockets wins.