Mike D’Antoni was understandably in a good mood Thursday night after the Rockets dominated the Thunder in the fourth quarter to take a 2-0 series lead.
“All we did was defend home court,” the Rockets coach told his team. “Now we gotta go to Oklahoma City to play.”
The joke mostly fell flat.
“They kind of laughed at me,” D’Antoni said.
Thunder point guard Chris Paul, whose postgame demeanor was anything but playful, certainly understood what D’Antoni was getting at.
“In a regular world,” Paul said, “not COVID, not a bubble, we’d be going back home for two games.