Rebuilding the Dream: The Next Era of Houston Rockets Basketball – Episode 16
On January 1st 2025 Houston welcomed in the New Year, a year that was looking very promising for the city’s professional basketball team, the Houston Rockets. The squad had won 21 of their first 32 games on the schedule and were 3rd in the Western Conference with less than 10 games to go before the halfway point of the regular season. Just below them in the standings were the Dallas Mavericks. Last year’s Western Conference Champions recently suffered a big blow as Luka Donchic injured his calf on Christmas Day and would be sidelined through January. Kyrie Irving would lead the Mavericks into their New Year’s Day game in Houston, hoping to avenge the loss they took to the Rockets on Halloween at the American Airlines Center. Amen Thompson was serving the 1st of a 2 game suspension for manhandling Tyler Herro in the Rockets previous game and Tari Eason was also out, missing his 7th straight game due to injury. The starters performed well across the board and in an expanded role, due to the absences of Eason and Amen, Cam Whitmore put in yet another impressive performance, scoring 18 points on 7 of 9 shooting and helping the Rockets get their 2nd win over Dallas on the season. Despite his strong showing, Cam was still frustrated with his uncertain role on the team and not confident about his ability to improve his situation.
The next team to travel to Houston would be the team that defeated Dallas in last year’s NBA Finals, the Boston Celtics. Ime Udokas, former team, now headed by Joe Mazzulla, were strong favourites to win the Eastern Conference once again, and their success was predicated on the basic mathematical principle that 3 is more valuable than 2. The Boston Celtics were pushing modern basketball theories on floor spacing and shot efficiency to limits that had never been seen before, shooting almost 50 3’s per game, accounting for well over half of their total shot attempts. Opinions about the direction the modern game is taking have recently led not only to pundits and former players levelling harsh criticism at the 3 point heavy style that is becoming the norm, but also an official investigation into the matter by the league itself. The beginnings of this tidal shift in how the game of basketball is played began in Houston, or more accurately, Rio Grande Valley.
In his desperation to win a Championship for the city of Houston, Rockets General manager at the time, Daryl Morey, a pioneer in using analytics to optimise his teams on court execution and his front offices decision making, arrived at the conclusion that the best way to win basketball games was for the offense to consistently take the most efficient shot possible. Morey identified layups and 3 point shots as the shots that produced the most points per attempt and thus set to work on creating the most efficient offense the league had ever seen. He instructed the Rockets G League organisation, the Rio Grande Valley Vipers, to engineer their offense to produce as many high value shots as possible. Morey also pushed for the Vipers to play as fast a pace as possible, reasoning that more shot attempts would naturally lead to more shots being made. In 2014, the Vipers averaged 109 possessions per game, over 10 more than the 7 seconds or less Suns. It wasn’t until 2017, when he hired Mike D’Antoni, that Daryl Morey was able to fully realise his theories on the big stage of the NBA and revolutionise the game of basketball as we know it.
The James Harden Houston Rocket teams of 2018 and 2019 broke NBA records for offensive efficiency and 3 point attempts. This provided a blueprint that the rest of the league would use to design their own interpretations of the modern pace and space offense. A wide variety of innovative shot adjustments and offensive sets have been developed over the past 5 years. The Celtics have arguably developed the most effective version of the pace and space style to date and it was on full display inside Toyota Center on January 3rd. In the 1st Quarter, Boston made 7 of their 12 three point attempts, putting up 37 points on one the best defenses in the league and made 5 more 3’s before halftime. Houston were still without Amen Thompson and Tari Eason and to make matters worse, starting Power Forward, Jabari Smith Jr, broke his hand during practice and could be out of action for up to 2 months. In the 3rd quarter, the Rockets held the Celtics to 2 of 8 from downtown and just 17 points total but their offense generated just 16 points as the deficit grew heading into the final quarter. Boston’s gameplan, the efficient 3 point heavy offense combined with an aggressive defensive tactic of crowding Sengun in the paint with length and daring Houston to beat them from downtown, worked to perfection.
The final contest of what had so far been a disappointing home stand would be in two days against the Los Angeles Lakers, their first matchup of the season against Lebron James’ team.
