Third quarter explosion propels Houston to victory.
MINNEAPOLIS – It was a tight game with the Rockets leading by only a point at the end of the half, 50-49. But Houston exploded for 50–that’s right, 5o–third-quarter points and rolled to a 119-100 win against the homestanding Timberwolves.
The fifty points rank second all-time for a team during a quarter in the playoffs–one point shy of the Los Angeles Lakers’ record 51 points scored in the fourth quarter in the March 31, 1962 playoff game against the Detroit Pistons.
“Everything just clicked,” Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni said.
Houston stars, James Harden and Chris Paul, combined for 37 points in the quarter–the most points they’ve scored together in any quarter. Harden’s 22 points were a franchise record, too, breaking Hakeem Olajuwon’s mark of 18 points scored against Utah in 1995.
“For myself and Chris, we had the mentality to be aggressive, make or miss shots,” said Harden, who finished with a game-high 36 points on 12-of-26 shooting.”
“That’s what we do. We shoot the basketball. Eventually, they’ll start falling. That’s what happened.” James Harden
The Rockets limited the Wolves to 20 points in that third quarter. It’s the third time that the Rockets have kept the Wolves from reaching their points-per-game average of 109.5 (regular season). The Wolves had 101 points in Game 1, 82 in Game 2, and 100 in Game 4.
“Obviously everybody will look at the 50 points that we scored in the quarter, but it was our defense,” Paul said. “We finally started getting them to take tough shots. We were getting rebounds and we’re tough in transition. You’ve got James coming downhill, myself and the way we’ve got the court spaced with shooters is big. That really turned it up for us.”
Houston will look to close out the series on Wednesday night in Houston. The tip is set for 9:30 PM, ET
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Updated data as of April 24. Sources: ESPN, CBS Sports
