As evidenced by two timeouts in the opening six minutes and an immediate 19-6 deficit, the Rockets were outplayed from the outset in Thursday’s blowout home loss to Golden State.
With the victory, the Warriors (42-34) all but eliminated the Rockets (38-38) from 2024 postseason contention. Houston has now lost three straight games coming off its 11-game winning streak.
In postgame comments, head coach Ime Udoka didn’t mince words when he was asked to dissect what went wrong. His remarks:
It looked like the moment was too big for a lot of players out there. The start looked like deer in headlights, a little bit. Looked soft or scared, one or the other, and that’s two important, two bad things for our guys to have. Didn’t rise up to the moment like I thought we would.
Complete video of Udoka’s remarks is available below.
Ime Udoka: "It looked like the moment was too big for a lot of players out there. Looked like deer in headlights a little bit. Either looked soft or scared, one or the other, [and] that's two bad things for a lot of our guys to have. Didn't rise up to the moment like I thought we… pic.twitter.com/98Co9t4QB6
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Led by the likes of Jalen Green, Jabari Smith Jr., and Amen Thompson, the Rockets remain a relatively young team. Thus, they should learn from this experience and take some important lessons as they head toward the NBA’s 2024-25 season and beyond.
It sounds as if Udoka will make sure they don’t forget.
