HOUSTON -- Patrick Beverley was in a mood all day. He showed up at a midmorning shootaround at the Toyota Center making definitive statements about his team and who the MVP should be.
He didn’t play in the Rockets' first meeting with the Cleveland Cavaliers on Nov. 1, but there was a feeling that the Rockets let one slip away that night. Beverley and his teammates were going to make sure it wouldn’t happen again.
And it didn't. Houston knocked off the defending champs 117-112 on Sunday in what was another statement victory for the third-place team in the Western Conference.
James Harden -- the guy who Beverley said is the MVP -- was terrific. He recorded his 16th triple-double of the season and 25th of his career, scoring 38 points and collecting 10 rebounds and 11 assists. The Rockets point guard (not sure if that’s sounding normal or not) scored or assisted on 65 points in the victory. And in what could be an MVP season, Harden has contributed on 3,765 points; when the Cavs' LeBron James won his MVP in the 2009-10 season, he scored or assisted on 3,754 points.
Part of the Rockets' defensive plan was to switch off. It hurt them in the first half, when the Cavs scored 41 second-quarter points to take a 67-58 lead. But the Rockets didn’t change that game plan, and they took over the contest in the third quarter, outscoring the Cavs 32-19, as Trevor Ariza and Harden were plus-13 for the frame. Harden scored 11 points, Ryan Anderson added eight points and the bench contributed eight more.
The Rockets had trailed 74-60 early in the third quarter before outscoring the Cavs 56-33 to take a 116-107 lead late in the fourth.
“It gives us a lot of confidence,” Harden said. “We got out to a really good start and we were relaxed, and they took advantage of us relaxing and they started knocking down 3s and getting easy baskets. Third quarter, defensively, we just locked in and we made them make tough shots; and offensively, we just did our thing. We got our shots, and we attacked the rim or whatnot. I guess there’s a lot of confidence knowing we can guard, and we’re going to have to guard in order to win.”
Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni said his team needed to keep things simple: If you switch off from someone, guard the new guy. That’s why you saw Nene Hilario take on Kyrie Irving and Beverley take on James.
“Resilient win,” Anderson said after finishing with 16 points. “I think this season we’ve had stretches where we started games really well, and then we have a stretch where a team catches back up or they go on a run and we might not answer or not answer as quick as we did tonight. We answered back -- it was resilient, it was a belief in our system and in each other.”
During the first meeting between these squads, in November, the Rockets were down by two points late but went on a nearly two-minute scoring drought and ended up losing 128-120. Ariza said that game was a blur, but when you’re the Rockets and trying to find your place among the elite of the West, you better fight in any signature matchup.
Since that loss to the Cavs, Beverley said the Rockets have been kicking butt.
The Rockets have mounted separate nine-game and 10-game win streaks, have pulsed to the third-best record in the West and are this close to clinching a playoff berth.
Last year, the Rockets didn’t clinch a playoff berth until the final day of the regular season.
When they do it this time, baseball teams will still be playing spring training games in Florida and Arizona.
"I think the coaching staff did a really good job of helping us fix the culture of what we had last year,” Harden said before the game. “The addition of new players, the same players that we had, we've meshed really well together since the beginning of the season, since the summertime. I think that carried over, even to now. We got good vibes. We might lose a few in a row, we know it’s back to work and figure out what we need to correct and go out there and play harder, and we've been doing that all year. That makes up for everything.”
