The Never-Ending Rivalry: Rockets vs. Jazz

[King Roosk]

Round 2 has arrived, and here we are: facing our old friends in the Utah Jazz. I personally think we match up well with Utah, and our regular-season performances against them are also encouraging. Hopefully we can get some payback for the Ls they gave us in the Yao-Mcgrady era.

[Pillendreher]

Do what we were too stupid to do: Defend a bad offensive team and attack them.

[Mr. E]

These guys...

Rockets with the Gentleman’s Sweep and on to the WCF.

[TMU]

I agree. No more than 5 games.

[King Roosk]

We blasted them in the regular season in a variety of ways. We even beat them without Clint, EG, and Ryno when they had their full squad on the second night of a back-to-back traveling from Denver to Utah.

Thabo Sefolosha played in 3/4 of our games this season (except for the last meeting on February 26th), but he's out for the season now and they only managed to replace him with Jae Crowder.

Rubio is expected to miss up to 10 days with a hamstring injury (he could return sooner if rehab goes well), so they'll have to give more minutes to either Exum or Alec Burks. They played Exum more throughout the 1st round and brought Burks in once Rubio went down, but Burks can score in flashes so I hope they stick with Exum. If they run stretches with Exum and Crowder on the court together, then I feel confident that our 2nd unit can take full advantage.

Still, it's always unsettling to play against a well-coached, scrappy defensive team with guys like Joe Ingles and Rudy Gobert. Oh, and that Donovan Mitchell guy is pretty good too.

Rockets in 6.

[jetlife_]

My only question is what are the defensive matchups like when/if Rubio gets back.

Who guards Mitchell? Paul? Ariza? Does Harden guard Rubio or Ingles? They'll get it done regardless, I'm just curious to see what the coaches will go with.

I think Tucker/Ryno have a chance to be big in this series, both as 4s and with Ryan playing small ball 5, pulling Favors/Gobert out of the paint. Hopefully Ryno plays better than Melo

[TMU]

We have plenty of bodies to slow down Mitchell, especially with Luc coming back. On offense we will pull Gobert to the perimeter via Paul/Harden-Swiss/Ryno pick and roll to death. That will expose their defense. We got this.

[BarneyGumble]

Hey guys, I remember the last time I came here was when we played your Rafer Alston team in the playoffs and we had won a surprising game 7 on your home floor a few years before that.

Its fun having a fun team, huh? Good luck either way it turns out....