What a performance of the Houston Rockets! In game 3 the best team of the Regular Season doesn’t give Utah Jazz the slightest chance and wins with 113:92 (BOXSCORE). Donovan Mitchell had a very weak evening.
Both teams continued to play the same way – and as in the series against OKC, the Vivint Smart Home Arena had a breathtaking atmosphere at their first home game. Nevertheless, the guests got off to a much better start in this match. As in game 1, James Harden and Chris Paul conducted the offense from the start and Houston took a 19-5 lead after a few minutes.
Utah couldn’t get any access to the game, even Dante Exum and Jae Crowder’s takings didn’t change that – Houston was already leading 30:12 when there were almost four minutes left to play in the first quarter. In the meantime it was even 22 points, with Utah waking up at least a little bit at the end of the quarter. After a quarter it was 39:22 for the guests.
The Rockets then continued seamlessly and even led briefly with 24 points, because Clint Capela felt that his own basket did not allow anything at all. Led by Royce O’Neale, Utah saw daylight with a 9-0 run, shortening to 15 points behind and escalating the hall again. Houston, however, was not at all deterred by this, on the contrary. Led by Harden, Paul and Eric Gordon, they countered sensationally with a 21:6 run and even extended the lead to 30 points – so the hall became calm. The guests took a break at 70:40.
Things should continue the same way after that. Utah did not hit his litters and was defensively helpless against almost unbelievably strong Rockets. The highest lead of the guests was 38 (!) points, at the end of the third quarter Donovan Mitchell finally arrived with two threes in the game, but that came much too late. It went to the last quarter with 93:65 for the Rockets. There the jazz came closer to 24 points, but not closer. 4:17 minutes before the end Mike D’Antoni took his starters out of play.
Top scorers of the Rockets were Harden and Gordon with 25 points each, Harden also played 12 Assists. Paul (16), Capela and Trevor Ariza (11 each) also scored double-digit points. In Jazz, O’Neale scored 17 points, Alec Burks 14, Rudy Gobert 12 and Mitchell finished with 10 points (4/16 FG).
Game 4 of the series will also take place in Salt Lake City on Monday night.
Utah Jazz v Houston Rockets 92:113, Series 1:2 (BOXSCORE)
Even if his own litter didn’t really want to fall (2/8 3FG), Harden showed an impressive, because incredibly concentrated performance. The MVP favourite played his passes with surgical precision and dissected the Jazz Defense without much effort, at 12 assists he only lost one ball. Which should be mentioned: Harden played good defense and played his part in the fact that Utah never really took place offensively.
The two best Jazz players in Game 2 were both out of action this time. Mitchell could hardly cope with the new coverage and shot one ticket after the other, Ingles did not fare much better (6 points, 2/10, plus 5 turnovers). Much more of both must come so that Utah can have a chance.
In game 2, one of the problems with the Rockets in the offense was that they made their way towards the zone, but then, out of respect for Gobert, did not go all the way through and in some cases ran out again almost fearfully. They reacted to that in this game by using the otherwise hated middle distance again – not only CP3 and Harden, but also Tucker or Gordon had the green light here, for example. Especially Gobert was more in the air again and had to decide if he should come out or stay with his own opponent Capela.