It's easy not to like the Rockets and their star guard James "The Beard" Harden. One way or another this team has ended up breaking the hearts of Blazer's fans for years. Plus, Harden's a serious flopper, as well as a frustratingly good shooter. Of course, Portland did get some very sweet revenge on this group back in 2014, but we can't ride on those fumes forever, and the Rockets got the better of the Blazers on Sunday night, 130-114.
The game started off with both teams hot on offense and cold on defense. They combined for a whopping 70 points in the first quarter alone, tied at 35. Harden was his usual self, strutting past Blazer defenders and getting to the foul line often. Newly acquired guard Eric Gordon was also hot for the Rockets and this would be a problem for the Blazers all night. He ended the game with an uncharacteristic 26 points off the bench.
Meanwhile, over on the Blazers bench, fans were buzzing about Meyers Leonard's new hairstyle:
CJ McCollum had a good night, for the most part, though he did pick up a weird technical foul for throwing the ball at the ref after getting stuffed by Patrick Beverly. That's two technicals in two games for the normally mild mannered CJ, if anyone's counting.
The Blazers went into halftime down by only 3 points and most of us had high hopes for a second half comeback. Coach Stotts was going to give them a pep talk and tighten up that D, we knew it! Here's a sampling of the fans seen wandering the hallways during the break:
The Blazer defense didn't tighten much for the second half, but their offense kept up and both teams played it pretty close throughout the third quarter. Things fell apart in the fourth though as Harden heated up and the Blazers got frustrated with his ability to charge into a moving defender and draw a foul. The jumbotron flashed on a fan holding a sign which read, "James Harden flops more than Jello" and everyone cheered. Shortly after that Harden dribbled by Moe Harkless and wrapped his arm around the defender, a sneaky play which pulled Harkless into him and drew yet another foul. Here's a picture of that move:
This was a significant moment because afterwards Harkless lost his composure and could be seen telling the ref, "You suck." The crowd got into the act too, and things just got ugly. Once a team starts focusing on the referees things are pretty much over. We kept our hopes up for some theatrics by Lillard in the final minutes, but the Rockets held strong and ran up their score to a dismal 130 points. Ugh.
I was feeling pretty down about the whole affair, but then I spotted my pal Madison Rowley who had recently been crowned a champion in the World Beard and Mustache competition over in Leogang, Austria. His beard was looking awesome and he showed me the signs he'd made for the game:
We'll see you again, Houston, and we've got our beards ready! Portland now sits at 9th place in the western conference with a 9 win, 10 loss record. It's not where we'd like to be, but the season is young and there's still plenty more time to grow.