The Rockets played at the Izod center and made Jay Z and the Nets their bitch for the 5th time in a row there. I watched it on the DVR as I didn’t get home until the 4th. Seriously, those things rule. The only problem is that I am dumb and at the end of my watching the first quarter I went to see "where the team was stats wise" on ESPN gametracker. The only problem was that I screwed myself; it showed me (obviously) the entire game. Why can’t they read my mind??? At least it was a win!

In the first I couldn’t believe my eyes. Yao jumped straight up and down and the referee didn’t call a foul on him!!! For some reason Vince Carter thinks that’s it is a foul, maybe he doesn’t know the rules like 90% of the refs, or maybe their miscalling of it so consistently has skewed his opinion. Of course they didn’t call anything in the first quarter and a half, so maybe the refs weren’t calling anything else so they couldn’t call that. It actually happened in the fourth quarter again, but that was only ten minutes or so after they did call it on him in the third. We have to work on consistency, but I liked it overall. The game was called pretty much perfectly for the Rockets. Contrary to popular belief, the NBA IS a contact sport/league.

The refs really called a great game; there I’ve said it for the first time all year…

As a team, the Rockets did a fantastic job of holding a lead. They ate clock like they were the 85 Bears, it was awesome. They weren’t in a hurry many times down the court and it helped them get better shots.

Overall it was a good game, we led pretty much the entire way, played some keep away and dominated a slightly above average team from the East. Granted they would be decidedly below average in the west, but that is neither here nor there.

Player Notes:
Stevie has really upped his passing game and he’s trying to get everyone involved. That will surely help his playing time once his ass bone stops hurting. And it’s obviously still bruised, that has to be the reason he grimaces every time he gets hit.

Bonzi missed 3 lay-ups, that is just crazy. Really he missed four, but one was on a foul, but should have easily been made. He made up for it by bricking a free throw right after.

TMac throws it right to Rafer…and he missed the shot. As he misses a fast break lay-up

The Hakeem footwork session really has paid off this year, Yao has looked exceptionally better around the basket. He just needs to learn to trust it. That’s what Hakeem had that no one else did, confidence that he was going to make the right decision. That confidence helped him flow. Yao still seems surprised when he makes an awesome move, that is slowly changing though, and that is awesome. Yao and his new moves completed their 11th double-double of the season. At one point in time Yao stood over Nachbar after dunking on him, it was obviously jokingly but it was no less awesome.