At the beginning of the second quarter, Eagle King Josh Smith continued to work alone, but the Eagles' substitutes dared not speak out.
Smith faced off against Rockets backup power forward Terrence Jones, and there was not much difference in height and weight between the two.
But Smith's athletic ability, movement control skills, singles ability and game experience are obviously superior to Jones.
Although the shot selection is still poor, Jones' defensive choices are also half-matched. The two sides really work hard and complement each other. Simply put, Jones unilaterally succeeded Smith.
Smith became more and more excited and confident as he played. Even if McHale realized Jones' tendency to "turn to the enemy" on the field in time and replaced him, it would not help.
With 3 minutes left in the first half, Smith led the Eagles to overtake the score, 45:46.
The Rockets are in urgent need of scoring to stabilize the situation on the court.
Harden stood up.
He received Jeremy Lin's pass at a familiar 45-degree angle and continued to dribble under his hips to adjust his rhythm.
Josh Smith near the bottom corner is eager to try, observing Harden's next move, ready to attack at any time.
Harden observed Smith's intention from the corner of his eye and saw that Harris' defensive position was to block his left hand. He resolutely dribbled the ball with his right hand and broke through to the front.
Smith waited for a long time and took a step forward to double-team. Unexpectedly, Harden made a pass to Patterson, who was smoking in the corner. Smith quickly braked and turned around, going back to defend his opposite Patterson.
When I turned around, I realized that Patterson was still smoking in the bottom corner. Where was the ball? The ball is gone.
Smith looked back again and found that Harden was fake. He was already in the clouds. After confronting Horford in the air, he picked up the basket with his right hand and scored the ball.
The referee's whistle blows, "And One!"
Patterson was murderous and he smiled innocently at Smith.
"Brother, what are you looking at?"
Smith was so angry that his face turned red and his neck was thick, and he started talking trash.
Harden was not disturbed at all and stood on the free throw line and made the ball steadily.
At 48:46, the Rockets overtook again.
In the following time, the Rockets maintained a slight lead until halftime.
The score between the two sides came to 57:55.
This is normal. After all, the Rockets' running-in time is too short, and they rely more on the personal abilities of Harden and Jeremy Lin to change the opponent's defense.
It is then up to the two of them to choose whether to fight on their own or give opportunities to their teammates.
This kind of offensive method is too single. When the opponent has sufficient defensive resources, or the two players feel bad, the team's offense will stagnate.
Sure enough, at the beginning of the second half, Harden's touch declined, and the team's offense suddenly lost power and fell into a scoring drought that lasted more than 6 minutes.
The Hawks took advantage of the situation and took the lead again. Fortunately, the entire Rockets team worked hard on the defensive end, and Harden did the same. It is also very difficult for the Eagles to score.
Finally, with 5 minutes and 33 seconds left in the third quarter, Harden used Asik's screen to escape from the defense and rush to the basket, causing Horford to foul and get two free throw opportunities.
Harden stood on the free throw line, adjusted his breathing by shooting the ball, and made two free throws steadily.
Helped the Rockets break the scoring drought, and the score reached 59:65.
In the following rounds, Harden's touch picked up and he combined with sudden shots to help the team recover from the decline.
In the transition period, Parsons led the team to continue to close the score, and the Eagles' Lou Williams did not give up too much. The two sides played back and forth, but the Rockets were still lagging behind.
In the last 5 minutes of the fourth quarter, with Jeremy Lin's counterattack and layup, the score reached 82:87, and the Rockets were still 5 points behind.
For the Hawks, Jeff Teague dribbled forward, and Horford and Smith set a double screen.
It created a very good shooting space for Korver who came out. Teague came to the lane, and there was no one in front of Korver. He raised his hand and hit a three-pointer.
At 82:90, the score difference came to 8 points.
Harden loudly ordered his teammates to move forward, and Jeremy Lin knew how to quickly serve the baseline ball.
After Harden caught the ball, he made a long throw and found Morris who ran near the three-point line in the frontcourt, and then ran towards the frontcourt.
The Eagles did not retreat in time and the defensive matchup was chaotic.
Morris glanced at Horford, who was guarding him, and glanced at the basket. Horford took a step forward and lost his center of gravity. Morris seized the opportunity and passed Horford in one step.
Seeing that the situation was not going well, the other Hawks players shrank toward the basket, with Horford chasing after him.
Morris secretly cheered. McHale had just led them to practice this quick baseline kick tactic several times in the morning training, and it happened to be used now.
Facing the defensive line that was gradually encircling him, Morris did not choose to attack the basket after combining the ball. Instead, he passed the ball behind his head and threw it hard.
The basketball came to the bearded man who had just reached the top of the key.
After Harden caught the ball, he adjusted, jumped slightly, and shot.
"Uh-huh!"
Three-pointer hit, "Answer Ball!"
At 85:90, the score difference returned to 5 points.
"Well done!"
Morris ran back and high-fived Harden and said loudly.
"Be careful, we can win."
Harden responded firmly.
Xu Xin was quite emotional when he saw this scene in the box.
In the last life, when Harden first arrived in the Rockets, his defense had not been criticized. Although the offense was far from as explosive as he was at his peak, he was willing to invest in the defensive end.
He has continued his style of defending the opponent's outside core during his time in the Thunder. Whether it is defensive attitude or defensive skills, he is above the league average.
Xu Xin was thinking about it when Harden successfully defended Harris' mid-range shot.
Asik blocked the rebound position. Jeremy Lin jumped high to collect the rebound and pushed back to counterattack.
Harden and Morris, as the two men whose running speed is second only to Jeremy Lin, follow up one to the left and the other to the right.
Standard third-line fast break.
On the Hawks side, only Teague and Korver retreated.
Jeremy Lin dribbled the ball at high speed to near the free throw line. Facing Morris, who was following up on the right, he lightly tossed with his right hand, but the basketball flew to the left.
Harden, who followed up from the left, leaped high and firmly grabbed the basketball in the air.
"state!"
Successful alley-oop dunk!
At 87:90, the Rockets closed the score to one round.
Seeing that the situation was not going well, Larry Drew quickly called a timeout.
He emphasized loudly without waiting for the players to take their seats on the bench:
"Retreat! Pay attention to retreat! Smith and Horford, if they fail to grab the offensive rebound, they must delay the ball holder as soon as possible, and the others must retreat quickly!"
On the Rockets bench, McHale was still giving passionate speeches to the players to boost the team's morale, but there were no specific tactical arrangements. Xu Xin shook his head and smiled bitterly when he saw this.
McHale is indeed a good coach. In his last life, he also led the Rockets to the Western Conference Finals.
But in terms of tactical division, he is definitely not a 'everyone'. She likes to give the stars a high degree of freedom and rely on the stars' personal abilities to win the game.
This is also the main reason why Harden used more singles with the ball in the Rockets' mid-term instead of running without the ball to find easier scoring opportunities.
Even if Paul came later and shared Harden's organizational pressure, the game only changed from Harden's singles to Harden and Paul taking turns.
