Never Again Courthouse 2 Step Match Houston
While the Rockets lost over again Tuesday to the Clippers, rookie Jalen Green's finishing kick could be something to build upon.
Marking Mulligan/Staff photographer
Houston Rockets centre Alperen Sengun (28) tries to shoot over Los Angeles Clippers eye Isaiah Hartenstein (55) during the offset half of an NBA game betwixt the Houston Rockets and Los Angeles Clippers, Tuesday, March ane, 2022, at Toyota Center in Houston.
Marker Mulligan/Staff lensman
Takeaways from the Rockets' 113-100 loss to the Los Angeles Clippers on Tuesday night at Toyota Center:
With the Rockets' losing streak at 10 games, their 2nd double-digit skid of the flavor, brilliant spots might seem difficult to find.
In that location is, withal, a half-full way of looking at the latest loss. The Rockets' defense was merely terrible for a stretch.
The Rockets did defend well for a half, seemingly demonstrating that they can. That'south something. Or at least, it volition take to practise.
Eventually, the Rockets' defence complanate once again. The Clippers went from scoring 20 points in the second quarter to 40 in the third.
Some of that was from the Clippers making shots they had been missing. Their second-quarter issues were far from entirely about the Rockets shutting them downward. But the Rockets had played with defensive discipline and energy long plenty to demonstrate that they tin.
A good bargain of the Rockets' defensive issues during the second half came from the disappointment and frustration of their ain misfiring. The intensity they brought into much of the game waned.
The Clippers got on the run with the help of all the defensive rebounds they gathered. Rarely having to slow downwardly to take the ball out of the net helped get them going every bit much as the Rockets' familiar defensive shortcomings.
But the Rockets did defend reasonably well for a game and a half. Equally they seek a style out of their latest skid, playing well enough defensively to take a take chances would be a skillful way to beginning, fifty-fifty if the improvements they showed Tuesday could not concluding.
1. Jalen Green, mid-range shots and the value of a closing kick
When Jalen Greenish checked back into the game with seven ½ minutes left, the Clippers had led by equally much as 21 and were nevertheless leading by 16. There was little chance that the Rockets were going to climb out of that hole, and with three minutes left, the atomic number 82 was back to 21.
Green played the residual of the fashion in the outset half of a back-to-back, going a game-high 33 ½ minutes. But he fabricated it useful, peradventure even valuable playing fourth dimension.
Green had made simply iv of 12 shots through three quarters, missing all v of his 3-pointers. He had come domicile on a nice hot streak, shooting 42 per centum from deep through February. Only he fabricated ii of ten 3s on Sunday and was misfiring again Tuesday.
Green, however, has looked more than confident and comfortable in the Rockets' offense, with a meliorate experience of how to become good looks. Even in Sunday's game, he was moving decisively to go those shots but missed.
Downwards the stretch Tuesday, he scored 12 of his twenty points, a vii-minute run when he made five of ix shots including his only 3-pointer of the nighttime. He played 72 minutes in the Rockets' losses to the Clippers, only he might have made it time well spent.
"I didn't want to go into the game tomorrow just out of rhythm," Light-green said. "I just wanted to continue attacking, existence ambitious."
With his run, Green has scored at to the lowest degree xx points in 3 of his past four games, and in double figures for 13 sequent games, matching his longest streak this flavour and the longest streak for a Rockets rookie since Yao Ming had a xiv-game run in 2002-03.
"He's very adept. He's going to be very good," Rockets coach Stephen Silas said. "He struggled there for a infinitesimal, and so it was good for him to come up back."
He also has shown signs of expanding his game, not relying as much on his iii-point touch. Teams will continue to make him evidence he volition knock downwards those shots. His quickness and improved ability to get to the rim will have teams going under screens and bankroll off, though since the start of Feb he has made a solid 36.viii percentage of his 3s fifty-fifty later on going iii of 16 in the past ii games. But Green has shown a willingness to mix in some mid-range jumpers, besides.
"I demand to first getting more than comfy (in the mid-range)," he said. "I'm working on that right now, still trying to get information technology down. The Clippers effort to get me to that in-between game. I got to know when to take those shots.
"Once I become the in-betwixt game, I think information technology will take my game to a whole other level."
The Jazz on Wednesday volition probable seek to accept away the rim as well, with Rudy Gobert the gold standard for rim protection. But Green did non return to the game to run out the clock Tuesday. He worked on things, found some success, and made plans to work some more.
"We talk about a lot as far every bit taking what the defense gives united states of america," Silas said of Green's mid-range game. "The mid-range was there a little bit more this evening than usual. I talk to him virtually giving it up and getting it back. He did more of that this night, as well. He's learning. He's definitely learning."
As with his rookie flavor as a whole, he also did not let information technology both him when he was missing shots.
"Yous've just always got to think your adjacent shot is going to go in," Green said. "Y'all're going to have the opportunity to shoot once again. Y'all're going to have the opportunity to go to the cup again."
two. Alperen Sengun learning the difficult fashion
Eventually, Rockets centre Alperen Sengun would become some scoring going. He put up adept numbers, finishing with 13 points, 9 rebounds, 3 steals and ii blocked shots, a combination unmatched by a Rockets rookie since Hakeem Olajuwon in April 1985.
More than impressive, or just more important, there was a stretch during the second quarter when he was missing shots but playing well defensively. He was effective in option-and-roll defence, making plays on that terminate. He showed comeback in his primary weakness.
Much of that was against Isaiah Hartenstein, who has played reliably well for the Clippers, rather than Ivica Zubac, who was on another level. But for Sengun, any success on the defensive terminate is a proficient sign given his skills and potential offensively.
"I experience ameliorate compared to the beginning of the season," Sengun said of his defense. "Also, I am in communication with my assistant coaches about defense. They are telling me what I should do, and I listen to them almost defense. I'grand learning every day."
Sengun has had his struggles defensively with some teams seeming to screen more always with his human being. It is far from uncommon to have centers setting screens to force switches or defensive decisions, only as they have seemed to target Sengun, he has seemed to learn from the mistakes.
There is a long way to become defensively just where young players can exist put in positions that it can hurt evolution to have things get badly, he seems to use those experiences to grow.
"Fifty-fifty when I'm making mistakes, I tin can see that I learn a lot," Sengun said. "It'southward really important for me.
"I'm feeling I vest in NBA basketball compared to the beginning of the season. I learn. I know much more about NBA basketball. I learned a lot."
3. A losing streak and the even tougher road ahead
The Rockets' schedule later on the All-Star interruption seemed like a bad or even fell joke. It was made worse when they left Orlando without a win then had a chance to stop their losing streak against the Clippers on Sunday and came up short.
With the losing streak at 10 games, they face the Jazz on Wednesday in the second half of the back-to-back and in a matchup of the league'south best criminal offense against the worst defense. They play in Denver on Friday before a back-to-back against the surging Grizzlies and Heat. That's a run of five games against three teams that accept won eight of their past ten games and 1 that has won nine of 10.
That does not seem to offer much opportunity to end the losing streak. If they don't accept one of those games, they would face the Lakers at dwelling house to avoid their 2d 15-game losing streak of the season.
"That ways nosotros've got to be locked in, gear up to play," forward Jae'Sean Tate said. "These teams around this time are trying to become their rhythm for the playoffs. They're very good opponents. Nosotros've got to bring our best every night if we want to exist competitive and attempt to win games."
In a season primarily about getting better, they might besides footstep up in weight form. The record does not matter at this bespeak. They could benefit from taking on some of the league'southward all-time teams, every bit with the game in Phoenix, likewise in the second one-half of a back-to-dorsum later on a blowout loss, when they played one of the better games of the flavour.
"That's the NBA," Rockets coach Stephen Silas said. "Information technology's actually an opportunity, to me, an opportunity to play a good team, to learn from this and acquire from the last fourth dimension we played the Clippers, acquire from the terminal time we played Utah, and testify who we are.
"This is the NBA. It's hard. Nosotros got a bunch of young guys who make mistakes but are trying as hard as they can. To take an opportunity tomorrow to do it against a good squad is good for our group."
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Source: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/texas-sports-nation/rockets/article/Rockets-defensive-issues-loss-to-Clippers-16970333.php
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