by Rizzo » Fri Jun 28, 2013 9:04 am
October 30, 2013
The enigmatic Royce White, coming off a solid rookie season, is expected to play a huge role on this team this year. Based on expert rankings, he is ranked as the #6 small forward in the league and is considered the #1 sleeper to watch. The season preview says that the Rockets will be the 13th best team in the West, so not much of an improvement over last season. If Royce White lives up to some of the preseason hype, maybe he can help lead this team into the playoffs. He has seemingly started to get his anxiety disorder under control [Mental Health Rating = 52] and hopefully he can becomes a permanent member of this team on all road trips. Only time will tell.
November 2, 2013
San Antonio Spurs (0-0) vs. Houston Rockets (0-0)
Spurs – 87
Tony Parker – 22 PTS, 6 AST
Boris Diaw – 15 PTS, 8 REB, 4 AST
Tim Duncan – 13 PTS, 7 REB, 2 BLK
Rockets – 134
James Harden – 27 PTS (11/15 FG)
Royce White – 24 PTS, 6 REB, 4 AST, 2 STL
Mike Conley – 20 PTS, 6 STL, 4 AST, 4 REB
Chandler Parsons – 20 PTS, 9 REB, 5 AST
Nerlens Noel – 13 PTS, 5 REB, 4 BLK
Trey Burke – 12 PTS, 4 REB, 3 AST, 2 STL, 4 TO
Cody Zeller – 4 PTS, 6 REB
Wow, what a performance to open the season in front of the Houston faithful! The holdovers from last season took the reigns and dominated while the new faces of Conley and the three rookies played better than expected. Our 76 points in the paint to their 44 hopefully shows we will start winning games in the paint. We also forced 21 turnovers to help balloon our lead to 50 at one point!
November 4, 2013
Number generator is kind to the Rockets once again as Royce White travels with the team.
Houston Rockets (1-0) vs. Denver Nuggets (1-0)
Rockets – 97
James Harden – 18 PTS
Royce White – 14 PTS
Omer Asik – 13 PTS, 13 REB, 4 BLK
Chandler Parsons – 12 PTS, 3 STL
Trey Burke – 11 PTS, 3 AST
Nerlens Noel – 5 PTS, 4 REB, fouled out in 9 minutes
Nuggets – 138
Kenneth Faried – 26 PTS, 13 REB, 4 BLK
Danilo Gallinari – 28 PTS
Andre Iguodala – 10 PTS, 6 REB, 13 AST, 3 STL, 2 BLK
Remember that paint defense we were excited about? Well we allowed 84 paint points this game and got destroyed. We were dominated on the glass and coughed it up 25 times. Yuck! Guess we are coming back down to earth after that first game.
November 6, 2013
Cleveland Cavaliers (2-1) vs. Houston Rockets (1-1)
Cavaliers – 99
Andrew Bynum – 27 PTS, 4 REB
Kyrie Irving – 14 PTS, 10 REB, 7 AST
Anthony Randolph – 16 PTS
Rockets – 131
Chandler Parsons – 23 PTS, 5 REB, 3 AST, 2 BLK
James Harden – 21 PTS, 4 AST
Trey Burke – 19 PTS, 3 AST
Royce White – 18 PTS, 6 REB, 2 STL
JJ Redick – 10 PTS, 3 REB, 3 AST
Nerlens Noel – 6 PTS, 2 REB, 1 BLK
Cody Zeller – 4 PTS, 3 REB, 2 BLK
Back in the win column as we had ourselves an offensive explosion. Outside of the newly inked Andrew Bynum, we kept the Cavaliers in check offensively and also forced 20 turnovers. Wins are good!
November 7, 2013
Houston Rockets (2-1) vs. Dallas Mavericks (0-2)
Rockets – 126
James Harden – 25 PTS, 4 REB, 4 AST
Mike Conley – 20 PTS, 9 AST, 4 STL
Patrick Patterson – 22 PTS, 2 BLK
Royce White – 14 PTS, 3 REB, 3 AST
Chandler Parsons – 13 PTS, 4 REB, 4 AST
Cody Zeller – 6 PTS, 3 REB, 3 STL, 1 BLK
Nerlens Noel – 4 PTS, 3 REB, 3 AST, 4 BLK
Mavericks – 110
Chris Kaman – 24 PTS
Dirk Nowitzki – 14 PTS, 7 REB
Another big win for the Rockets and this one has extra meaning as we own the Mavericks’ 2014 first round pick thanks to the Donatas Motiejunas trade last season. Hopefully they continue to lose as this draft is absolutely stacked with talent!
November 10, 2013
Royce White, again, is on the team charter to Utah.
Houston Rockets (3-1) vs. Utah Jazz (0-4)
Rockets – 104
Mike Conley – 24 PTS, 8 AST
Royce White – 16 PTS, 5 REB, 4 AST
James Harden – 13 PTS (5-17 FG)
Omer Asik – 10 PTS, 11 REB, 2 BLK
Trey Burke – 8 PTS, 2 AST
Jazz – 113
Paul Millsap – 25 PTS, 13 REB, 3 STL
Al Jefferson – 25 PTS, 10 REB, 3 BLK
Alonzo Gee – 18 PTS, 7 REB
Gordon Hayward – 15 PTS
DJ Augustin – 12 PTS, 15 AST
You never like to give a team their first win of the season, but Utah is as physically tough a team as we will play all season long, especially in the paint. To be honest, we don’t have the strongest team in the league, especially when our big men are more of the athletic variety rather than bruisers like Millsap, Jefferson and Favors.
November 12, 2013
Houston Rockets (3-2) vs. Golden State Warriors (3-3)
Rockets – 92
James Harden – 14 PTS, 5 REB, 4 AST
Mike Conley – 13 PTS
Royce White – 11 PTS
Trey Burke – 11 PTS
Omer Asik – 10 PTS, 9 REB
Warriors – 115
Stephen Curry – 34 PTS, 7 AST, 6 REB, 2 STL
Klay Thompson – 29 PTS, 6 AST
Andrew Bogut – 15 PTS, 13 REB, 5 BLK
After getting blown out by 23 points in the 3rd quarter alone, there was no coming back in this one. We were outrebounded by 15 and shot just 41%. Just an ugly outing tonight.
Royce White, for all of his offensive gifts, is far and away our worst defensive player. He faces 11.3 drivers per game and stops 0.3 of them, good for a 2.9% stop percentage. He also allows one point per shot faced, but thankfully he faces the least amount of shots on the team, so that doesn’t hurt us as bad. We are going to move Chandler Parsons into the starting lineup and hope that bringing White off the bench will keep him from being as big of a defensive liability.
November 14, 2013
Los Angeles Clippers (3-2) vs. Houston Rockets (3-3)
Clippers – 122
DeAndre Jordan – 31 PTS, 13 REB, 5 BLK
Blake Griffin – 24 PTS, 19 REB, 3 BLK
Chris Paul – 17 PTS, 10 AST
Rockets – 130
Omer Asik – 14 PTS, 14 REB, 4 BLK, 3 STL
Royce White – 23 PTS, 3 REB, 2 AST
James Harden – 21 PTS
Chandler Parsons – 19 PTS
Trey Burke – 19 PTS
Mike Conley – 13 PTS, 5 AST, 5 STL
Nerlens Noel – 6 PTS, 6 REB, 4 BLK
In yet another defense-optional game, the Rockets pull out a win over a very good team. This was back-and-forth as there were 27 lead changes and 16 ties throughout. The kicker was the turnover differential as we had just eight compared to their 20. Ball protection was a key to our offseason and it paid off tonight.
