All season long, the Rockets has played better on the road. They usually come out with more energy and more passion. At home they usually started sluggish and slow, with tonight's game a disturbing example of that. They seem to feed off the boos and jeers, and make it a point to silence the hostile crowd with big plays and clutch shots down the stretch. This was particularly true after watching the first four playoff games in the Houston Rockets v Dallas Mavericks series. You could see it in the way Tmac looks at the crowd in Dallas after every big shot he makes, Yao's fist-pumping delight after that big dunk off a pass from Tmac that put the Rockets up by 2 with a minute left in the game and the overall intensity of the bench and their reactions after every made or missed shot of the Rockets. Dallas' home and road record in the regular season and in the current playoffs are identical. They play as well or as bad at home and on the road, depending on how you want to put it. So for those of you counting Houston out of this series, remember that its now a best of 3 with the Rockets having the road court advantage. Until Dallas proves me otherwise and wins 2 more games, I'd still have to take the Rockets. I say we win in 7 games with the road team taking every game. I believe! Go Rockets!
I don't think there's any road court advantage... The Dallas fans will be going crazy now that their team has scrapped back from a huge hole....we got a tough game 5. It's dangerous, because Dallas could roll. Unless these Rockets are made of sterner stuff.
The scary thing for the Rockets is that Dirk has only played well in one of the four games in this series, yet the series is tied. Dirk's playoff history suggests that he usually performs better in the playoffs (statistically, at least) than in the regular season, so if playoff Dirk shows up in game 5, watch out. Could get ugly real quick for the Rockets. Still, Yao has really had only one game where he had a huge impact, so if he can show up in Game 5 like he did in Game 2, Rockets could take back control of this series.
Well for some reason our players seem to play better on the road than at home. That wa the trend all season long and it has continued into the playoffs. However, winning game 5 might be the toughest game to win on the road. Dallas fans will be going crazy and I doubt the Rockets will get to many calls going their way. It going to depend on our outside shooting. If Barry, James, and Wesley get hot the Rockets can pull out a close win. If they go cold then the Rockets could lose by 10+ pts.
It certainly is a big test for this team. Not the biggest of tests....that would be going down 3-2. Let's hope they don't need to have that kind of super gut check.
