Predict this: Harden leads 7 in double figures, Rockets take Game 1 over Mavs
Before it became clear which opponent his Dallas Mavericks would face in the opening round of the 2015 NBA playoffs, owner Mark Cuban told Grantland’s Kirk Goldsberry he’d pick James Harden as this year’s Most Valuable Player for his work in propelling the Houston Rockets, “because that’s not a very good team over there.” Cuban also called the Rockets, as constructed by fellow analytics advocate and longtime foil Daryl Morey, “predictable,” because “you know exactly what they’re going to do” in an offense that emphasizes shots at the rim, from the free-throw line and from beyond the 3-point arc.
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“If you know what the percentages are, in the playoffs, you have time to counter them,” Cuban told Goldsberry. “Whether you’re good enough to do it is another question.”
Dallas wasn’t good enough to do it on Saturday, as the Rockets controlled the contest en route to a 118-108 win that gave them a 1-0 lead in their best-of-seven series. But while we respect Cuban’s smarts and foresight, we have a hard time believing he pegged the way Houston would take care of business to open the series.
Far from a case of Harden carrying overmatched and underwhelming teammates, Game 1 saw Houston handle Dallas behind a balanced attack in which eight of nine Rockets to play scored at least eight points. Yes, Harden led the way with 24 points and 11 assists against just two turnovers in 39 minutes, but on a night where he didn’t showcase MVP-caliber shotmaking — 4-for-11 from the floor, 1-for-5 from 3-point land, evened out by a 15-for-17 mark at the free-throw line — he got by with a little help from his friends.
He got a big boost from star center Dwight Howard, who missed half the season with right knee trouble, but looked as good as he has in a long time on Saturday:
Howard was a terror from the tip, bulling his way to the front of the rim on offense and locking down the paint on defense, pushing the Rockets to a 19-6 lead midway through the first quarter. His presence went a long way toward explaining Dallas’ ice-cold 3-for-12 start from the floor.
Combine that with lackadaisical play that seemed uncharacteristic for the poised, veteran Mavericks — ill-timed gambles, late rotations, lacking awareness off the ball, sloppy passes leading to turnovers and runouts — and you’ve got a recipe for Houston leading by 13 after 12 minutes.
Howard wasn’t Harden’s only helper. Power forward Terrence Jones flashed the athleticism and versatility that made him such an integral part of the Rockets’ lineup. Neither he nor any other Rocket had great success checking Dallas legend Dirk Nowitzki, who finished with a Mavs-high 24 points on 10-for-14 shooting to go with eight rebounds, but the Kentucky product gave as good as he got, scoring 19 points, grabbing nine rebounds and dishing six assists in 33 1/2 minutes.
Longtime Maverick Jason Terry seemed to relish the opportunity to drop bombs on his former mates, scoring 16 points on 4-for-7 shooting from 3-point land, and even coming pretty close to a dunk early in the first quarter. Trevor Ariza was vital, scoring 12 points on 3-for-6 shooting, making both his 3-point tries and all four of his free throws, while also adding a team-high 11 rebounds, six assists and three steals. The 6-foot-8 Ariza also neutralized Monta Ellis, Dallas’ leading scorer during the regular season, helping hold him to 16 points on 5-for-16 shooting.
Veteran swingman Corey Brewer chipped in 15 points off the Houston bench and shot 3-for-4 from 3-point land — a pretty timely hot streak for a career 29 percent long-range shooter — including this big shot from the short corner midway through the fourth quarter that stemmed a Mavs run and pushed Houston’s lead back to double figures:
After scoring 13 of his 15 points in the fourth, Brewer — who spent three months with the 2010-11 Mavericks before Cubes and company shipped him to the Denver Nuggets during the enusing offseason — admitted he enjoyed sticking it to Dallas:
Actually, it was a 2016 second-round pick that was later redirected to the Boston Celtics in December’s Rajon Rondo deal, so we’ll still need to wait a while to find out what flavor those chips turn out to be. (Pretty hard feelings for a guy who got a ring with those 2011 Mavs, Corey!)
Speaking of Rondo, an awful lot of ink was spilled in the lead-up to Saturday (including in our own preview) about “Playoff Rondo” — the cranked-up version of the point guard who elevates his level of play come springtime, the irresistible performer who can look like the best player on the floor in a series featuring a half-dozen Hall of Famers — and whether he’d turn up for Dallas after a three-year absence from postseason play. Early on, the answer seemed to be no, as Rondo looked somewhat tentative and unwilling to attack, going scoreless with just one assist in the first quarter.
Maybe he was just stuck in traffic. Come the second quarter — and following Howard’s exit after picking up his third foul, which might not be a coincidence — Rondo started to look a bit like the fire of old:
The forever probing point man began to find his rhythm, picking out the right passes on the break, in delayed transition and in the half-court. Several of those passes went to Nowitzki, who got warm after a cold start, making all four of his shots in the quarter. Rondo also showing an increased willingness to actually take the shots he was creating for himself; even better, he made them, scoring 11 points on 5-for-7 shooting with three dimes in the quarter.
Rondo made his presence felt on the other end, too, pressing Harden both on and off the ball. He made the Rockets playmaker work not only to get the ball — often successfully, resulting in other Rockets trying to make plays, often unsuccessfully (we’re looking at you and your three second-quarter turnovers, Josh Smith) — but also when he got it, limiting Harden to just one field-goal attempt in the second.
When Howard checked out with three fouls the 9:56 mark of the second, Houston held a 12-point lead. Six minutes later, Dallas had taken the lead, capping a 23-7 run built largely on drives to the rim against the likes of Smith or rookie pogo-stick Clint Capela.
After a mostly quiet stanza, Harden sparked an important late-quarter shift that helped Houston get back on the good foot heading into halftime.
With the Rockets trailing by one, he found himself cross-matched and defending Mavericks center Tyson Chandler in the post. Rather than give the big man time to back him down, Harden pounced as soon as Chandler went into his move, picking his pocket and racing down the floor. He drew a foul on Nowitzki on the break — a questionable one, perhaps — and got to the line for two free throws that put Houston back on top.
After a Rondo layup, Harden drew another foul on Dallas reserve Charlie Villanueva for two more freebies. Then, after a missed Ellis runner, Harden held up just enough on the push to spot Ariza wide-open on the wing for a 3 that rolled around the rim, bounced up and out, then splashed down through with 10 seconds left. In 47 seconds, Harden turned a one-point deficit for a lifeless team into a four-point halftime lead, giving his team some momentum.
They built on it after the break, with Howard back from his foul-trouble exile and sparking an instant turnaround on both ends by blocking shots and finishing lobs:
Howard picked up his fourth just four minutes after halftime, though, and continued to battle foul trouble throughout. He played just 17 minutes and 22 seconds in Game 1, but he made a massive mark, finishing with 11 points, five rebounds, five blocks and a steal, while making Dallas’ offense look punchless when he played:
With Howard limited, Kevin McHale needed his other players to step up, and they answered the call. I wouldn’t bank on getting a pair of scramble-drill, shot-clock-buzzer-beating jumpers from Ariza and Brewer to keep Dallas at bay in the fourth quarter every night, but they came through on Saturday, putting the onus on Rick Carlisle to fix some issues if the Mavs hope to come away with a road split on Tuesday.
They’ll need to tighten up their ball-handling and passing, because the Rockets are good enough without the kind of help that 17 turnovers (and 23 points off them) provide. They’ll need to find more ways of getting the ball to Nowitzki, the one player for whom Houston doesn’t really have a defensive answer. Jones, Ariza, Brewer, Harden and Terry all saw time on him on Saturday, and he got his shot off against all of them, shooting a cool 71.4 percent from the field.
They’ll also need to find some way to mitigate the damage Dirk causes on the other end, because Houston was relentless in attacking the 36-year-old 7-footer in the pick-and-roll game, getting past the initial line of defense easily and essentially guiding ball-handlers straight to the rim for buckets. And they’ll need to get more out of Ellis and Rondo, who was whisper-quiet offensively outside the confines of that second-quarter surge (just two points on 2-for-9 shooting and two assists in quarters 1, 3 and 4).
They’ll also have to hope a couple of days of rest helps Chandler Parsons, who missed the last six games of the regular season with a right knee injury, showed some bounce early, but briefly left the game midway through the second after aggravating it. He returned and played the rest of the game, finishing with 10 points on 5-for-15 shooting to go with six rebounds and two assists, but he didn’t have his typical lift and felt things getting worse as the game went on; Dallas needs his shooting and playmaking to be able to score enough to hang with Houston.
Most importantly, though, while Dallas will have to keep working to make Harden’s teammates beat them, they’ll also have to actually stop those teammates from doing it. Forcing the ball out of Harden’s hands only works if you prevent your preferred option from hurting you, too. Dallas couldn’t on Saturday, leading to seven Rockets scoring in double-figures.
“That means everybody’s touching the basketball, everybody’s getting involved and they can’t only just stop one person,” Harden said after the game, according to Kristie Rieken of The Associated Press. “They put two on the ball, I make the pocket pass, I made the easy play and had confidence in my teammates to make the next one.”
It might not have been quite what Cuban or many other observers predicted, but it sure was effective, and as a result, Houston’s drawn first blood.
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
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