Dave Hardisty

Tonight, it sort of feels like you get one back because you're down 13 in the second half against a Suns team.

I know they're on night two of a back-to-back, but they're playing well right now.

They beat the Thunder last night.

It's a good team, even if the roster, it feels like they're playing above their heads.

They're playing well right now.

The Rockets were down 13.

They found a way.

I think a lot of what happened down the stretch, they expended so much energy in the comeback going from down 13 to up seven that they were on fumes by the end.

But in the final two minutes, a man and then most notably KD just found a way.

And it's not saying that this team is head and shoulders above last year's team, but it does have a gear that last year's team doesn't have, most notably Kevin Durant.

Yeah, the defense is what flipped the game from down 13 to up 7.

It felt like midway through the fourth quarter, it was a little ominous when Imei pulled three of the five at about the six-minute mark when they were playing so well, because I thought that was a pretty clear tell that these guys must be running on fumes.

So...

The moral of the story, don't fall down by 13 points.

I think early in the game especially, the turnovers combined with Phoenix making an ungodly chunk of their threes in the first half sort of put the Rockets behind the eight ball.

And so I think, you know, I'm less bothered, you know, when we look at it from a macro perspective, I'm less bothered by the Rockets letting the seven-point lead slip away in the fourth quarter than I am them falling behind by 13 over the first 30 minutes of the game.

Because I think the first 30 minutes of the game,

that's where they did a lot of just very sloppy and uncharacteristic things.

It felt like with no Shingun, there were a lot of the turnovers that were guys just being indecisive.

Like when Shingun's out there, you know, he soaks up a lot of the playmaking reps.