D’Antoni walks back pledge

Coach Mike D’Antoni said his initial reaction to Friday’s blowout loss to the Clippers and his intention to scrap the emphasis on defensive switching might have been hasty or at least exaggerated.

But he said 100 percent of Sunday’s video session before practice focused on the defensive end, with goals to correct the mistakes that have dropped the Rockets to 1-4.

“I said that. I got too much adrenaline going,” D’Antoni said of his proclamation Friday. “You always tweak everything. What it comes down to, we have to do what we do harder, better, longer. I used that phrase last year a lot of times. We have to do that now.

“It’s complicated. James

( Harden) being out. Chris (Paul) being out before.

James Ennis. We have rookies playing. We just have to do a better job of doing what we do and tweaking what we have to tweak. We’ll find that going forward. You don’t know what to tweak when you’re not playing good enough, doing the right things. Rotations, we’re hesitating because we don’t know. Not that we don’t want to, but we’re a little bit slow reacting.”

The Rockets said the day’s video review showed a lack of cohesion and communication defensively, leading to mistakes.

“Defensively, we’re not as connected as we should be,” guard/forward Gerald

Green said. “I think communication level is not good for us.

“We’re not communicating on the floor on the defensive end like we should. It’s got guys in a situation they don’t know whether to go or not go. We should get better at that.”

The Rockets rank in a tie for 26th defensively, allowing 114.7 points per 100 possessions.

They have used a different starting lineup in their past four games and have used rookies Isaiah Hartenstein

and Gary Clark for short stints.

But D’Antoni said the shortcomings have been in execution rather than using a scheme better suited to last season’s roster.

“We’ve got to get better defensively,” he said. “We have to rebound better. We have to get into people. There’s a lot of things we have to do better. It’s not one thing, but a lot of things contribute.

“Even when you win, you’re always saying, ‘We got to get into the ball better,’ or ‘We got to rebound the ball better.’ And you’re winning.

“You’re losing and you start to lose your confidence and we can’t have that.”

Expectations worsen issues

As much as the Rockets have struggled to start the season, forward Carmelo

Anthony said the issues could be exaggerated because they are compared to the team’s aspirations.

“I think it’s over-amplified when it’s the team that has so much expectations,” Anthony said. “Regardless of it’s at the beginning of the season, regardless of it’s at the end of the season, a team that has this much expectation to not only get to the playoffs, but win a championship, of course this will always be magnified times 100.”

Centers return to practice

After spending the first five games of the season with as many centers out with injuries as they had on the roster this past season, the Rockets got two back Sunday with a chance both will be cleared to play in Tuesday night’s home contest against the Portland Trail Blazers. Marquese Chriss (sprained left ankle) and

Zhou Qi (sprained knee) practiced Sunday, though it was too soon to know if either would enter the rotation where rookie

Isaiah Hartenstein has played as a backup to Clint Capela. “I think they will be (available,)” coach Mi ke D’Antoni said. “The next two practices will determine that.”