Rockets 100, Wizards 93: Three thoughts

There may or may not be a moral victory somewhere in there, but there’s certainly plenty of historic-level futility. The Wizards are now a franchise-worst 0-15 on the road to start this season and have lost 16 straight away from home dating to last season. But this was a game Washington will look back on and wonder how it slipped away. Despite the Rockets’ four-game winning streak overall and seven-game winning streak at home, they couldn’t shake the Wizards until the final four minutes, and shouldn’t have had the chance to. John Wall came off the bench again to help pull back a nine-point margin in the first quarter, and Houston never led again by more than three points until the final two minutes. In fact, it was Washington that squandered its own ten-point lead with ten minutes remaining, an 82-72 margin off a Nick Young three-pointer.

But like the Miami game at home nine days ago, don’t underestimate the Wizards’ ability to unravel down the stretch. By the 6:39 mark, Shane Battier’s three-pointer had put Houston back in front, 87-86.

Washington never scored again after Andray Blatche’s reverse layup made it 93-92 at the 3:31 mark in the fourth quarter. Rashard Lewis was stripped by Kyle Lowry, and Kevin Martin made two free throws at the other end of the floor; Blatche turned the ball over for the game-high sixth time and Aaron Brooks knocked down a three-pointer; and it was all over when Blatche rebounded Wall’s forced miss in the lane but Blatche was left splattered on the hardwood when he missed his putback while Martin put the nail in the coffin from beyond the arc at the 1:50 mark.

Blatche made a big impact in his return to the starting lineup, but he made sure to sprinkle his night with plenty of frustratingly familiar moments. Despite a heady stat line (17 points, 14 rebounds, three steals, two blocks, two assists) and a number of clutch plays, including a cheeky steal on a inbounds pass after a Wizards bucket in the third quarter, Blatche was also a team-worst -17 on the night, reflecting his difficulty, among other things, guarding Houston center Chuck Hayes, who at 6-foot-6 gave up a whopping five inches to the 6-11 Wizards big man. And the problem with Blatche’s turnovers is that most of them are a result of carelessness, either with the ball or his pivot foot, and not aggressive plays that involve his teammates. Plus, in a close game like the one Washington played tonight, turnovers are almost always inopportune, usually resulting in the lead changing hands. Blatche’s sixth turnover against the Rockets opened the door for Brooks’s three-pointer and Houston’s biggest lead of the second half to that point.

Since Battier and Chase Bundinger can loosely be described as frontcourt players, the Rockets got 21 of their 32 points in the fourth quarter from their guards. If you include points from Battier and Budinger, then it’s 28 out of 32. The Wizards may have some of the best and quickest ball-swiping hands in the league, but they were toast against Brooks and Martin, who were both composed and savvy in the final period while Wall was lightning fast as always but also ragged and out of control. The Wizards also haven’t figured out how best to use Lewis, who had 12 points on 16 shots along with nine rebounds and five assists, and who said, if Gilbert Arenas paraphrasing Nick Young is to believed, that getting traded to Washington ‘feels like the world ended.’ Considering he hasn’t played in a win yet for his new team, which has lost ten of its last 11 games and three in row, Lewis has good reason to feel the way he does. Unless and until the Wizards ever turn the corner away from home, or consistently in any manner, there won’t be a compelling argument to change Lewis’s mind.