StarTrubine: Rockets rout Wolves 121-101 in Houston

I knew a Rockets' Win is due, but I just didn't want to ruin the surprise

Rockets rout Wolves 121-101 in Houston
Steve Aschburner
Star Tribune

Published Feb. 1, 2003 WOLF0201

HOUSTON -- The Houston Rockets were supposed to have softened up the Dallas Mavericks for the Timberwolves.

Instead, the Mavericks softened up the Wolves for the Rockets.

Following that? The Wolves were the team that was supposed to benefit on a two-step through Texas, sitting in Dallas Wednesday and waiting for the Mavericks, who were playing in Houston. But Dallas won big, then still looked pretty fresh in beating the Wolves on Thursday.

That meant the Wolves had to hustle down to Houston on their back-to-back to face the now-rested Rockets. And it showed in Houston's 121-101 victory Friday night at Compaq Center.

After giving up a season-high 112 points to Dallas, the Wolves gave up even more 24 hours later. Three Rockets -- Steve Francis (27), Yao Ming (24) and Cuttino Mobley (22) -- each topped 20 points in a flashback for the Wolves' to Dallas vaunted Big Three. Yao had 13 rebounds and three blocks.

Houston shot a season-best 58.1 percent and outscored Minnesota in the lane 62-40.

The Wolves (27-20) have dropped two in a row after their six-game winning streak and went 1-2 over five days against the Texas trio of Midwest Division rivals.

Adding injury to insult, Wolves forward Joe Smith, after a dunk to end the third quarter, landed on Yao's foot and went down in pain. He was helped off the floor with a sprained right ankle and never returned, after a play that merely shaved his club's deficit to 90-74.

Guard Troy Hudson led the Wolves with 23 points and Wally Szczerbiak scored 20. But Kevin Garnett, searching for energy and frustrated much of the game, finished with 14 points on 6-of-15 shooting with seven rebounds. And if that wasn't aggravating enough, there was the infernal "Yao Ming" song played over the P.A. system any time the rookie big man scored or blocked a shot.

Despite losing five of their previous six games (three by 20 points or more), the Rockets (25-20) beat the Wolves for the second time in three meetings. They moved within a game of Minnesota in the division and conference standings, and visit Target Center on Tuesday in the season-series finale.

After a decent start -- 12-7 through the game's first five minutes -- the Wolves sputtered. They lost command in a 10-4 Rockets spurt, then got outshot and outquicked in the second quarter by Houston's guard-heavy lineup, and trailed by as much as 12 points.

The Wolves tightened up to five points late in the half 56-51 before Yao finished with a dunk at the horn on a bizarre play that left Rockets guard Moochie Norris sprawled in an aisle with a strained back for five minutes into the halftime break.

In a chase for a loose ball at the Wolves' end, Norris saved the ball on the left sideline and fired it back to a teammate. But his momentum carried him over the first row of seats at courtside and onto the concrete floor. Houston finished the play -- Francis set up Yao for the alley-oop slam -- and then headed off through a tunnel at midcourt, unaware that Norris was lying hurt just 30 feet away.

Finally, trainer Keith Jones was waved over. A crowd hovered, with fans finally cheering when Norris stood up and walked gingerly to the locker room. He came out for the second half just before the end of warmups.

The Rockets outscored the Wolves 16-6 over the first four minutes of the third quarter, pumping their lead to 74-57. They were enjoying it, too, looking for dunks and alley-oop passes as often as possible. And they continued to pelt the Wolves from deep in the right corner -- all five of their three-pointers, by that point, had come from that spot.

In the fourth, the Wolves got as close as 98-87 with 7:52 left. The big spread led to some extracurriculars, such as Eddie Griffin getting a technical foul for yapping and shoving Garnett after James Posey swatted Garnett's shot out of bounds. Later, Garnett batted at Francis' swinging feet after a dunk, sending the Rockets point guard to the court looking to a ref for justice.

 

Gosh, now you mentioned it. Yao's big toe is made of ....

 

Me too, I thought smoke was coming out of KG's rear orifice in that altercation. He seems really upset.