Fourth Quarter remains: Some observations on the Lakers game.

Just some random thoughts as we head into crunch time:

<b>Stevie needs to teach the other guys how to rebound.</b>
Franchise is a great rebounder, but he's not doing anything out there our forwards couldn't do. He's just active, follows the ball and chases it down. It'd be great to see this kind of energy from our big men.

<b>Lakers make the most of their opportunities.</b>
Particularly in the first half, I noticed the Lakers are very good at cleaning up their own mess. Their role players do their job well - following shots, grabbing the offensive rebounds, putbacks. The Rockets could take a cue from this.

<b>Awful officiating.</b>
This is something I usually don't talk about, because I don't believe this is something you can blame a loss on. And that applies here. However, tonight really was particularly bad. As Worrell pointed out, heading into the fourth quarter Shaq didn't have a <b>single</b> foul....c'mon.

<b>We'd be in deep sh*t without Willis.</b>
I almost think this game is a blowout without him. He's great at moving toward the basket when we spread the offense out and let Franics break the defense down and penetrate - something we need to do a <b>lot</b> more of. The only negative about Big Kev are his hands. Waaay too many scoring opportunities flutter through his grasp.

<b>I'd like to see some TMo, dammit.</b>
Rockets don't have the talent to establish themselves in the post. They are struggling offensively, so they aren't able to make an impact by settling for outside shooting. The way they have been getting back into games is with energy and defensive play. When they seem to find some emotion, become active and do some things on defense they have made a difference. Those are the sorts of things we saw from Morris in the preseason.

<b>For some reason, Rick Fox really annoys me.</b>
That's all I have to say about that.

Now to buckle down and see if they can get the win...

 

New observation:

<b>Ugly losses suck.</b>
Man we had every opportunity to get this game...then to lose it like that...