Rockets drop scrappy game to Mavericks

Photo courtesy of Troy Taormina/USA Today Sports

The I-45 rivalry is never an easy game, and fans were in for yet another treat of a contest on Monday night. It was just a shame that the hometown Rockets came out as the losers.

A competitive game saw the visiting Dallas Mavericks, led by young superstar Luka Dončić, topple James Harden and the Houston Rockets by a score of 113-100 on Monday evening, taking the first of three contests the two teams will play against each other throughout the season.

The score doesn't do the game justice. The Rockets had three occasions where they cut the lead down to two, including one instance where the team was down that amount with about six and a half minutes left in the fourth quarter, but a 19-8 run by Dallas in the remaining minutes would prove to be the difference as the Mavs prevailed.

Luka Dončić had missed the team's previous game in Chicago with a leg contusion and had been slumping before the contest, but he lit up the stat sheet with an impressive performance. He notched a triple-double with 33 points, 16 rebounds, and 11 assists, torching Houston defensively almost single-handedly.

He had some help, too. As he has an annoying propensity for doing, Tim Hardaway Jr. flourished against the Rockets, even from the bench. He ended up going for 30 points of his own, including a scorching eight made threes on ten shots from deep.

Houston tried their best to match the pace. Christian Wood, in yet another good game that is becoming commonplace for him, went for 23 points and seven rebounds in the loss. He is quickly becoming a name thrown around for the Most Improved Player award.

Unfortunately, the rest of the squad had trouble showing up offensively. James Harden had a quiet night (by his standards, anyway), going for a mere 21 points and ten assists on only five made field goals. John Wall was even quieter, scoring only 14 points to go with four assists and four rebounds.

It was a night to forget for the team as a whole. The squad shot just 39% from the field, and a porous 27.5% from three, paling in comparison to Dallas's 47.6% overall and scorching 41% from three.

Making matters worse was the early ejection of DeMarcus Cousins in the second quarter, who was tossed after making a layup and pleading for a foul call with his arms raised, a fairly standard practice for professional basketball players. However, it was apparently enough to warrant his second technical foul of the night, resulting in his immediate ejection from the contest.

It was a tightly-officiated game all around--six technical fouls in total were handed out between the two teams, with one Flagrant 1 foul thrown into the mix.

Houston, now 2-3, will look to put the loss behind them as they travel to Indianapolis to take on the 5-2 Indiana Pacers on Wednesday. They'll hope to have Danuel House Jr., who missed tonight's game due to back spasms, return by then.