The Rockets Are Wary Of Changing Their Gameplan, But In The Playoffs It Is Adapt Or Die

If game one is any indication – and I tend to believe it will in most respects – then the Western Conference Semifinals is going to be a ruthless melee.

There is no love lost from either team, especially from Houston, who to this day believe that they were cheated out of a trip to the NBA Finals. 

Reminiscent of last year’s seven-game classic, the Rockets shot 14-47 from three, with Harden scrounging 35 points on 9-28 shooting because he got to the line 14 times, Eric Gordon put up 27 on 19 shots, Kevin Durant was unstoppable with 35 points and Curry scored only 17 but cooked Nene on the clinching three in the final minute. 

Despite the horrendously entertaining game, one we have been waiting over 300 days for, virtually the only talk since the final buzzer has been on the refs. Whether they made the right calls; whether they call the Rockets and Warriors differently; whether the Warriors are dirty or the Rockers are flopping and everything else under the sun.

Through the Rockets’ lens, it makes narrative sense to focus on the officials.

Houston’s gameplan is to manipulate the referees in ambiguous situations, specifically on three-pointers. They rely on Harden, Paul and Gordon not only combining to take more threes than anyone in history but also getting fouled on those threes more than anyone in history. 

To the Rockets’ credit, the returns from a season worth of ref baiting have been in the red: They won 52 games and Harden was the first player since Dwight Howard in 2010-11 to average 11 free throw attempts per game and only the sixth guard all-time. 

Since their first playoff meeting with the Warriors in 2014-15, Houston has gone to the line 103 more times than the Warriors, and have a 218-163 advantage in the eight games in the second round or later that are either within 10 points or an elimination game, a 33.7% difference in free throw attempts.

And yet, they still felt robbed (yet again) by the officials after game one.

It makes sense that despite getting 29 free throws (to the Warriors’ 27), they are upset not that they aren’t getting foul calls, but that they aren’t getting the foul calls that they want: on threes.

Surprisingly, despite four postseasons of evidence, they have yet to learn one crucial lesson: gameplans don’t catch in the postseason, especially not those reliant on a variable they can’t control. 

The Warriors figured that out in the 2016 Finals. After dominating with Curry and Thompson’s three-point prowess and winning the title in 2015, they fell to the Cavaliers in 2016, a team dependent not on three-pointers, free throws or any other numbers game; they had two shot-makers who were better than the Warriors had at the time.

In the final three games, the Warriors shot 44-123 from behind the arc (35.7%), 14-41 in game seven (half their field goal attempts), and couldn’t beat a team that went 6-25 from three in the ultimate game. 

At a certain point, the game devolves and gameplans go out the window and a blown 3-1 lead and a 1-10 mark from three in the fourth quarter of game seven was all it took for the Warriors to realize this. 

Now, they had the liberty of picking up the greatest shot-maker in the history of the game in Kevin Durant, but even so they know when and where to turn to him – he has averaged 2.2 more field goal attempts in the playoffs with Golden State – and they have had to in their most pivotal moments. 

The Rockets have lost every postseason because their strategy always falls apart, going back to 2017, when they shot 20-68 (29.4%) in the last six quarters and overtime of their series against the Spurs, losing game six 114-75.

And yet two years and another heart-breaking loss later, the Rockets are not merely not adjusting their gameplan, they’re doubling down, shooting 43 three-pointers a game this postseason and still attempting to coax the referees into giving them foul calls, unearned or not.

In the waning moments of game one we saw the consequences. After Curry hit a three over mismatched Nene, Harden drove for an easy dunk before Durant turned the ball over against a double-team. Much like in Houston’s win in early January, down 103-100, Harden had the ball with under 15 seconds and a chance to decide the game but tried to goad the official into calling a foul on a missed three, a call he got 100 times over in the regular season. He missed the shot, there was no foul, Paul turned it over and was ejected and the Golden State won game one. 

In the last five minutes, KD had five shots and two free throws, and the rest of the team had five field goal attempts including Curry’s dagger and Iggy’s transition dunk. Harden took six shots, three of which had the express purpose of drawing a foul, missing the final three-pointer, another triple earlier and one of two free throws on one trip. The two plays he actually attacked – with 40 seconds left and with 21 seconds left – yielded five points, the only five they got in the final 1:50 of the game.

We see the disparate offensive styles the most then: the Warriors will turn to Durant or Curry – whoever has the biggest mismatch – or finding open shooters. The Rockets will shoot threes and goad referees until they die, as they have every year now. 

For Houston, it's unfortunate because Harden and Paul are two of the best halfcourt and isolation creators and craftiest scorers in the league, but they have claimed their hill and are more than willing to die on it.

There is no doubt that some of the calls during the game that Harden and D’Antoni harped upon were missed, including at least two by Klay Thompson on James Harden in the first half that set the tone for the level of pressure in the rest of the game.

But when you exaggerate contact and change landing zones to the extent that the Rockets do, it is challenging for the officials to differentiate between what is real and what is phantom.

Harden said after the game he just wants a “fair chance” and for the refs to “call the game how it’s supposed to be called,” but his own slithery playing style has changed the way referees call the game. 

It becomes even more difficult in the playoffs when defenses up the pressure and there is viable contact multiple times every play, as Steve Javie said on ESPN’s postgame show Sunday afternoon. 

“We don’t have playoff calls and regular season calls,” Javie said. “In the playoffs… you guys contest every shot, every possession. It becomes a more difficult game to officiate… you can’t do that for 82 games but in the series… you’re going to have more contact.”

Officiating is an imperfect science and relying on it against the Warriors is a game of roulette.

The same goes for three-pointers. 

There is a point of diminished return, and the Rockets have been able to find it time and again.

Since game one of the 2018 WCF, the Rockets have shot 101-324 (31%) from behind the arc and 28-118 (23.7%) since the second quarter of game six.

And yes, some of that is because of the increased, oft-uncalled pressure from the defenders. But the mark of a championship team is adaptability. Steve Kerr putting Andre Iguodala in the starting lineup down 2-1 in the 2015 Finals. LeBron James and Kyrie Irving becoming ultra-aggressive down 3-1 in 2016. Stephen Curry taking a step back offensively and averaging a near triple-double in the 2017 Finals. 

If Harden and the Rockets can’t adapt against the Warriors, then they will get another chance to put together a report for the league office.