The Rockets are a team that has taken small ball to an extreme level. They have no true center on their roster. If you want to count Tyson Chandler, go ahead. At this point, he's just coaching them from the sidelines. And their game plan is pretty simple: live and die by the 3 and hope you can outscore your opponent. This team before the trade deadline retooled to have the roster consist of Westbrook, Harden, and a bunch of sharpshooting "3 and D" players.
Despite being undersized, the Rockets are a tough, scrappy team. Harden made some clutch defensive plays in these playoffs. Robert Covington is a solid 2-way role player. P.J. Tucker is a dog out there. Westbrook can play D when healthy. This roster has some dogs. If I heard right, their defense has been top-tier throughout their series against OKC. The seventh game saw them in a close win, but their first three wins, they dominated the Thunder on both ends of the floor. But, credit to the Thunder, a team with .2% chance of making the playoffs, they hung in there and almost pulled off the win. If they won, all hell would've broken loose in Houston.
Now, we look at how the Lakers match up. In the series against Portland, the Lakers only had Jusuf Nurkic and Hassan Whiteside to worry about in the paint. But, they still imposed their will with the two-man powerhouse of LeBron James and Anthony Davis. By Game 3, LeBron was in attack mode and the series was history. Well, it was history when they went full Black Mamba mode in Game 4. The Lakers present a big mismatch for the Rockets. They're not facing a clumsy Steven Adams or an undersized CP3. They're facing a freight train disguised as a point guard and a titan with skills. We expect the Lakers to impose their will and use their size to feast inside the paint. Defensively, Houston may be small, but they're not going to back down. Simply put, they have to be the more physical team and it starts with the two man game of LeBron and AD being aggressive on both ends of the floor.
There are two problems that the Lakers are going to encounter defensively. Obviously Westbrook and Harden are a problem. But, they also need to clamp down on the perimeter. Westbrook and Harden are dangerous when they shoot their patented midrange and stepback three efficiently. Not to mention, one can pick up the slack when the other is underperforming. Take the OKC series as evidence. Dame and McCollum were a handful for Caruso, KCP, Danny Green, and Kuz. What more with this backcourt of two ex-MVPs? They will obviously try to get whistles in their favor. Whoever is guarding them, they must remain disciplined and stay in front of them at all times. If the Lakers apply help defense, they should anticipate early that they will kick it to the open man from the perimeter. As I mentioned, Houston's role players are sharpshooters. They can chuck up as many threes as they want because they are confident in those shots. Not to mention, when you have Harden and Westbrook breaking down the defense, they will sit comfortably from the 3-point line because they know they have a higher percentage shot.
For an X-factor, I hope the Lakers worked on their threes all week long. The last time these two teams met, the 3-point differential favored the Rockets by a huge margin. In the first round, we saw encouraging signs that the Lakers are slowly getting that 3-point shooting going. If the Lakers continue to strive and shoot efficiently from deep while dominating the paint, Houston will have no answer and this series will be over in a blur.
Lakers will be well-rested for this series. They haven't looked well in the bubble overall. But, based on that first round series against Portland, it looks like they've shaken off some rust and got back into midseason form prior to the league suspension. This is a salivating matchup for the Lakers. As long as they do all the aformentioned things and not turn the ball over more than Houston, they could very well take this in a four-game sweep. Maybe they'll allow one generous win. But from what I saw from the Lakers against Portland and how Houston struggled to put OKC away down the stretch of their 1st round series, this presents a very advantageous matchup in favor of the LakeShow. I'll see you guys back here on Friday after the game.
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