2nd time all month

This is the second time all month that the Rockets did not have at least one starter play 40 minutes plus in a game. The first time was the very first game in December when they blew out the Grizzlies and pretty much had everyone sitting the entire fourth. Heck no one played more than 33 minutes tonight.

The more nights like tonight we see - the better the team is getting healthy again and players are going to soon settle into their new roles. This is going to do wonders for guys like Ariza and Harden who were on pace to just wear themselves down at the rate they are going.

I have no idea what may become of the whole Josh Smith ordeal but if Jones can come back after the new year and not have to sit again that just adds even more depth up front allowing guys like D-Mo and Howard to remain fresh. Same will apply if it is Josh Smith who does sign here. You could just see it tonight that there was no real drop in energy (huge shout out to Corey Brewer to just being that energy guy the team desperately needed off the bench) throughout the game.

A lot of the games this year the Rockets seemed to just run on fumes towards the end as the rotation forced them to play heavy heavy minutes. Hopefully now that everyone is getting back and healthy there will be no more serious injuries to this team. The 110 points was the highest all month in a non-OT game - this is just more attributed to fresher legs. The 47% FG for the game tonight was the highest for any game in December - a full 3% higher than the Memphis game (and the next highest was around 41 I believe). All this will start paying huge benefits soon enough

Having to incorporate players back into the rotation usually does cause some bumps and it seemed to happen against NO and ATL (both of whom are very good teams in their own right too - especially ATL), but hopefully they can take this pretty thorough victory and carry it onto the next game against Memphis.

Its nice to see that things are actually starting to trend upward for this team as they close 2014 against some tough playoff teams and Charlotte - they are going to need it.