ClutchFans Game Thread: Blazers @ Rockets 4/20/2014 (Playoffs Round 1, Game 1)

That's all for Howard. It will be unrealistic to expect more from him! For Harden, what can you expect more from him? This team's future is very much depends on who's playing with them. Melo won't be the best answer. Instead, developing Lins will be the best choice.

 

Can someone post a summary of player's performance?

 

we lost because of the defense strategy on LMA, and i think its on Mchale...DMO's height and mobility would probably work or at least helped deny the ball better, however, McHale decided to play 8-man rotation, which is why we have foul trouble late in the game.

 

Also, playing JHarden 45 minutes.
CParsons 47 minutes.

And we wonder how come they couldnt contribute all that much towards the end.

 

I thought the box score was broken when i saw it. It did not show any dnps. 8 man rotation. Even if we pull out this series everyone will be tired, hurt or injured by the time we play the spurs.

Maybe this is mchales way of saying get me a bench. Also, I am a little surprised he went with garcia over casspi. I would have pulled out garcia for casspi much sooner though. Especially after garcia shot that contested three over giving howard the ball when he wanted it,

 

First quarter parsons, mathews owning harden on the block
Second quarter more parsons, some harden, a lot of jones
Third quarter some howard, some harden
4th quarter lin, the patented rockets collapse losing a double digit lead thanks to hack a howard and portland getting hot from three, rockets cant grab a rebound.
Every quarter and especially late rockets cant grab a rebound.
Overtime lin, aldridge, and batum then lillard took over

Beverley consistently did his thing on offense and defense.
Aldridge owned any and everyone and took over when he wanted.

Mchale sucked at subs, officials wouldnt let anyone breathe on aldridge, it came down to the lat bearhug/whistle... game blouses

 

what is that going to do? can you remember a certain player who w****'d the no.1 jersey? he said it's on me all the time.
we just got to do the little things to win, like boxing out or hitting fts

 

One step closer to firing McHale... only positive from this game.

 

He picked the wrong 8

 

No one in the league has Bev's energy. He will be missed. But if you are being honest he definitely had some moments where he played a little out of control last night. Not saying he wasn't effective. Just he could have stepped it down a notch. Or maybe he couldn't.

 

With that logic, you would say Lin should start.

 

Harden and Parsons are our worst defenders all season. If either of them could've shut Aldridge down it would've been the magic bullet and game changer for the series.

 

What a great game, extremely disappointed that we loss to the point I couldn't even sleep. With Beverly out its going to be extremely tough to win. I still think we win the series, however in 7. We need to make some type of statement here though to get one of the free agents.

If we lose this series though, look for McHale to be gone.

 

there is only 1 player the rockets need to get to the next level but unfortunately he is playing for portland and that is aldridge...

between aldridge and the hack a howard i really think those are the 2 main things that caused the loss. beard missed some key shots but he also made some great ones so they evened out.

i don't even want to think about bev not playing but hopefully he'll have a good recovery before game 2.

in the immortal words of Florida Evans from Good Times...Damn! Damn! Damn!
Now we have to win the next game.

 

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Column: After Game 1 collapse, the burden's on Dwight Howard to deliver these Houston Rockets out of darkness. <a href="http://t.co/RVKdV0ODVr">http://t.co/RVKdV0ODVr</a></p>&mdash; Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojYahooNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/WojYahooNBA/statuses/458183936037101568">April 21, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Dime on the Portland-Houston craziness and the last man standing: <a href="http://t.co/piQPWn647b">http://t.co/piQPWn647b</a> [free]</p>&mdash; Tom Haberstroh (@tomhaberstroh) <a href="https://twitter.com/tomhaberstroh/statuses/458155372038344704">April 21, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

For 45 minutes, the Rockets were the better team, even with Harden and, at least early on, Howard clearly off their game. Foul trouble is the only thing that kept Portland within striking distance. Poor FT shooting in the final 3 minutes + Chandler guarding LMA and LMA going beast mode + 2 crazy shots from Lillard/LMA led to a stolen W for Portland.

My only fear is that this was a demoralizing loss that will be hard to bounce back from, but with Harden & Howard I expect a strong G2 performance. Let's even the series out.

 

If DLillard continues to get those numbers, it's a strategy worth exploring.

Might not work but who knows? *shrugs*

I reckon if we could have hit more of our FTs (we made 26 but missed 14!),
play a 9 man rotation instead of 8 (Parsons played 47 mins, JHarden 45),
all this is a non-discussion.

Disappointed.

 

First quarter: "man, the refs/nba want a seven game series"

(Seriously, how do you game plan around such atrocious and arbitrary calls?)

Bad thing is I can't shake an Aerosmith song out of my head...

"Get yourself a cooler
lay yourself low
coincidental murder
with nothing to show
with the judge's constipation (think refs)
will go to his head
and his wife's aggravation
you'll soon end up dead.

It's the same old story,
Same old song and dance, my friend"


Color me null & void today.

 

Everyone relax and take a deep breath. Yes, it sucks but remember that it was only Game 1.
Win Game 2, split in Portland(at the minimum), we will be fine.

 

dont know if we can put this blame on the refs. we got the benefit of the call for most of the 2nd