HOUSTON (SportsRadio 610)- Less than an hour after the Rockets opened their 2019 playoff run with a resounding 122-90 win over the Utah Jazz, James Harden was asked if this was the message his team wanted to send to begin the postseason. After a quick "yeah", the Rockets guard got a little side tracked recalling some recent history.
"I don't mean to bring up last year, but we played pretty well game one last year and game two they came in and beat us."
The Rockets won game one of their second round series against the Jazz 110-96, but three nights later, the Jazz put up 64 points in the first half and won game two 116-108. Faced with the same scenario in 2019, Harden and the Rockets are determined a repeat doesn't happen Wednesday night.
"One thing about talking about it and then just going out and doing it," Rockets head coach Mike D'Antoni said Tuesday. "We still gotta have the killer instinct and the mindset and the appropriate fear of entering this game, and hopefully we have that."
Before Tuesday's practice the team held its first film session since Sunday's win, and Rockets forward P.J. Tucker noticed a myriad of issues.
"We still have a bunch areas we can get better at," he said. "Still gave up a bunch of easy points. We need to be up on our screens a little bit more, we let them turn the corner a little bit too much, and trust our that our help-side is gonna be there and depend on one another."
Still, it would be human nature to come out flat after such a dominating win, but the Rockets are making sure they avoid that.
"Me and James were in the locker room just now, and I think coach has said it before, when you win you feel like you're never going to lose again and when you lose you feel like you're never going to win again, so it's just staying even-keeled and realizing that we gotta stay focused because that game is over and we gotta take care of game two," Rockets guard Chris Paul said.
All the Rockets did Sunday was win the first game of a best-of-seven series on their home floor. If they slip up Wednesday, their series advantage disappears as does the homecourt advantage, and even though the Jazz were knocked around Sunday night, Tucker knows Wednesday is a completely different game.
"They're gonna come out and play. They got a good team, those guys have been around, they know how to play. They're not scared, they're gonna come out and try to win game two. They know they won (game two) last year, so we know they're gonna try and put themselves in that position again, so it's up to us to come with that same mentality as we did in game one."
