When I was a kid, I slept late. The school bus would come into my neighborhood and make a loop. I should have gotten up on time and been ready when it went by my house. But a couple of times I missed it and discovered that I could run down the street and catch it on the way out of the neighborhood. This is a dangerous discovery. If you're like me, you think, "Hey, it's OK if I oversleep. I'll just catch it at the end." This happens a lot in sports. It often happens to the Rockets. I think it has happened in this series. Game 1: We start out alert and playing hard on every possession, especially on the boards and on defense. We're not hitting our shots, but through focus and effort, we keep it close. Then, as our shots start falling, we pull away. Game 2: We just smoked them by 30. So, heck, we don't need all that focus and effort. So we start out slack and fall behind. If the Thunder were better or played better, we'd lose. But we don't. We catch up at the end with some moves and makes, and thank you to Westbrook for ignoring and icing his teammates and bricking all those shots. Game 3: We just won Game 2 after starting with little focus or effort. This is easy! So we do it again. This time, we fall further behind. By late in the 3rd and the 4th, given our inferior work on defense and the boards, we have no business being in this game. But, incredibly, we are. Lou has some nice shooting, Harden gets calls on the road, and we're still in it. We lose on a miss at the buzzer. Recap: First we got up early and were ready for the bus. Then we overslept and still made the bus. Then we overslept and almost made the bus ... but not quite. I wish Harden had hit that shot. But sooner or later, given our trajectory in the series, we were going to miss the bus. The important thing is to learn from it, and get up earlier tomorrow.
Nearly every team let's up a bit - it's why it's so hard to sweep a team. And OKC is not an easy pushover team as the 6th seed. The games were close during the regular season, and they have a great coach led by the presumed MVP. They are a flawed team, but so are we. I did not think a lack of focus was the issue tonight. It was simply a matter of missing shots
If the Rockets approach game 4 like they approached game 1, they win. All about playing with a sense of urgency.
I called it. Game 1. I saw a rare sense of urgency from Harden, he imposed his will on the free throw lane. Game 2. He came out flat,careless, and overconfident but luckily our GREAT team carried his ass. Game 3. I didn't watch.
Doesn't really matter if we catch the bus, because we're chasing the short bus this year. And here is the other kids on the bus cheering for you as you barely miss the bus.
The good thing about this game was OKC played their best game ever to win by 2 points, with a shot a by Harden at the end of the game that had every butthole clinched like a little raisin in that building and across oklahoma. This is like taking somebodys strongest jab only for them to get knocked the fugg out later.
I thoguht we didn't play so badly. Liked that we kept ou composure when thunder made runs and were hitting all shots. To their credit, they adjusted and Westbrook played in control. I'll get worried if we lose badly the game on sunday, but last night, Thunder just got hot and we missed some easy shots. Hope next game, we really focus on staying home on Westbrooks teammates and bait him into going heroball.
He was one of the biggest culprits in the first quarter. Was playing like he was playing a game of catch with Kardashian in his backyard. Careless TO after careless TO... Set the temp early on. Take care of the ****ing ball.
It starts with him. He sets a lazy lethargic approach to start... come right not the bat and attack somebody. Make somebody a victim all night Hakeem/Jordan/Kobe style.
