Asked what he could glean from the Rockets’ previous game against the Heat, the game they trailed 26-4 before Miami fans got comfortable and trailed by 42 early in the second quarter, Rockets coach Mike D’Antoni was stumped.
“Against who?” D’Antoni said. "What game? What game? I don’t remember that game.”
Yeah, he did. The Rockets could not possibly have forgotten. But more than seek to avenge the Heat-down they took that day, they needed to turn around a three-game slide and the issues that led to it.
The 117-108 win against the Heat might not have been an answer to the blowout the Rockets stumbled through in Miami, but it was a reasonable facsimile, with the Rockets leading by 25 before slowing down in the fourth quarter.