The Rockets’ defense went from woefully shorthanded to a “work in progress” on Thursday. Yet, as much as they struggled to slow the Kings, as they had the Trail Blazers and Nuggets, any progress was welcome and the difference in a win.
“Defensively, when we needed to get stops, we got stops,” Rockets guard James Harden said. “Obviously, there’s a lot to correct, a lot to get better at.”
The Kings had made 48.8 percent of their shots and led by five with five minutes left before they made 4 of 12 shots down the stretch.
Still, through three games the Rockets rank 28th in the NBA defensively, 29th in opposing scoring and defensive rebounding percentage.
“It was ragged,” Rockets coach Stephen Silas said of the Rockets defense. “We had our ups and downs, but I think down the stretch of the game we came up with some big stops, like when we were down five and needed stop after stop after stop. We were getting those stops.
“It’s a real work in progress. But I keep continuing to say, we haven’t been together long. We haven’t had a bunch of practice time to get all of our defensive concepts together.”
Some of the issues have come, he said, from changing some of the Rockets’ coverages but without practice time with key players out in training camp and others through the first week of the season.
“We’ve kind of gone back and forth between switching and not switching,” Silas said. “The switching part we have guys who are comfortable with but other guys who weren’t here last year aren’t so comfortable with it. And we have the part we were playing a little more traditional. Everybody is trying to get used to it.
“We’re going to be fine defensively. I told the guys as long as we’re working and trying hard and playing hard through some of those mistakes we’re making, we’ll get better and better and better.”
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January 02, 2021 at 07:22AM
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Rockets defense better late but still needs improvements - Houston Chronicle
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