A pair of surging teams will have their winning streaks on the line Saturday night when the Houston Rockets host the Chicago Bulls.
Houston (42-25), a winner of five games in a row, has a chance to inch closer to the No. 2 spot in the Western Conference standings. The Rockets trail the Denver Nuggets by a game.
The Rockets, who are nearing the end of their five-year postseason drought, extended their recent good fortune with Friday’s 133-96 blowout of the Dallas Mavericks.
A trend throughout Houston’s resurgent season has been its work on the glass. The Rockets boast an NBA-best average of 48.5 rebounds per game, with the dominance on full display Friday. Houston outrebounded Dallas 67-34, including a 17-6 on offense.
“One of our points of emphasis this season was to be the best offensive rebounding team in the league,” Rockets coach Ime Udoka said. “Obviously we showed that tonight; we had 29 second-chance points off of 17 offensive rebounds and then 28 fast-break points. Turning defense into offense is always a good formula for us. We’re at our best when we do that.”
Houston’s Alperen Sengun recorded 15 of those rebounds on Friday, which were paired with his 16 points and four assists.
Tari Eason led the way with a career-high 30 points for the Rockets, who surpassed last year’s win total and clinched their first winning season since the 2019-20 campaign.
Jalen Green paces the team with an average of 21.1 points per game, followed by Sengun (19.2) and Fred VanVleet (14.3).
Chicago (28-38) has pieced together a season-long four-game winning streak to pull within a game of the slumping Miami Heat for ninth place in the Eastern Conference. The Bulls trail the eighth-place Orlando Magic by two games and sit 3 1/2 behind the No. 7 Atlanta Hawks.
In the midst of trying to save what appeared to be a hapless season, Chicago extended its winning streak on Thursday with a 116-110 home victory over the Brooklyn Nets.
The Bulls held the Nets to 18 points in the fourth quarter, helping Chicago overcome a 12-point third-quarter deficit. The group’s defensive intensity certainly hasn’t been a mainstay this season, as it ranks second-worst with 120.2 points per game allowed, but Thursday may have been a step in the right direction.
“We’ve been trying to talk about it all year long — we’re not going to make shots every night,” coach Billy Donovan said. “I think there’s a mental resiliency component when it comes to finding other ways to win.”
The Bulls have had no shortage of production over their last four games, led by Coby White’s 31.3 scoring average over the stretch. White’s 19.3 ppg for the season leads the team, while Nikola Vucevic chips in 18.8 points and 10.2 rebounds per game.
Chicago and Houston met on Nov. 17, with the Rockets breezing to a 143-107 win. Sengun recorded a 20-point, 11-rebound, 11-assists triple-double in the victory.
–Field Level Media
