The championships years are obvious, so after that, which do you think ? Rockets made Two other Finals besides the championships years -- once with a low 40-win team from outta nowhere, the other, perhaps lost against the greatest team ever... sounds familiar for some reason. The 2018 West Finals was the Finals.. plus, Rockets set the Franchise Record for Wins, easily.. and got its First #1 Seed. This seems the best season, but I didn't really experience 80's Rockets.
Great point. And probably the most famous shot in franchise history. Maybe Top 10 in league history. The 2018 would have the 65 Wins and MVP advantage, but '86 is legit.
I personally think two seven footers who are more athletic than Capela would wreak havoc on the league Dream put the hurt on people in 86 What do you think would happen if Draymond poked Dream in the eye ? Draymond would be headless
Would be a great series between 2018 Rockets and 86 Rockets. Ultimately, I think 86 would win because we'd get nothing at the rim.
ESPN rated Top 50 teams ever today. No rocket team listed. Although they have some teams that never won a ring. http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/13000418/where-golden-state-warriors-rank-50-greatest-nba-teams
I'm almost tempted to say '81 for the simple reason that a 40-42 team went to the finals and actually won two games against the mighty Celtics.
No we lost cause we didn’t make adjustments in two games Every rocket team gets screwed by the refs This year is no exception
I'd say '86. That team was so young , so big and so talented. We knocked off the defending champion Showtitme Lakers and lost to probably the greatest Celtics team ever in the finals. The difference there was that after the finals everyone (not just in Houston) assumed that we'd win titles in the near future. It was not "if", it was just a matter of "when". We were a dynasty in the making. NBA teams immediately began trying to copy the twin tower blueprint in order to compete against Houston. It eventually all came undone with Wiggins and Lloyd's suspensions and Ralph's knee injury but it was sure fun to watch while it lasted. We used raw talent to beat the mighty Lakers. We were just a bit too young to conquer the great '86 Celtics. That Celtics team was stacked and in addition to being great players they had an off the chart BB IQ. That ended up making the difference but we weren't that far off. A backcourt that went 6'8" and 6'6"" with a 7'4" PF and an 7' athletic freak at center. They were just so big and athletic. It was almost like some type of weird science experiment, it wasn't like anything that anyone had ever seen. You weren't suppose to be able to block Kareem's skyhook and big guys weren't suppose to run the floor like that and a 7'4" guy shouldn't be able to lead a fast break. There was so much confidence and hope that came out of that season, that's why I'd say that that was the best non-championship season. http://grantland.com/features/an-oral-history-hakeem-olajuwon-ralph-sampson-1980s-houston-rockets/
This year we basically lost to the finals, taking one of the best teams ever to 7 games before an injury to our second best player.
This rockets team was a 70 win team by all objective measures if you factor in the injuries and that they threw some games at the end for rest.
Getting to the Finals trumps getting to game 7 of the WCF. Having a great regular season alone is not good enough. Remember when 1 seed Dallas got smoked by 8 seed GSW? Lol that still makes me laugh
Counting the playoffs, we got to watch the Rockets win 76 games this season. 76! It was a great season that ended in a frustrating, heartbreaking way.
I remember and it was great seeing them lose. The 2018 Rockets own a MUCH different outcome than those Mavs though.
I'd agree with you except that this year the Western Conference Finals were the Finals. Everyone knew who ever won that series was taking home the trophy and it wouldn't be close.
'92-'93. It was the foundation for the B2B. Close @#4, '85-'86. So much promise for the future, such disappointment thereafter. Joe Barry Apathy, anyone?