Aug 17, 2020Even though he won't be playing early in the series, Russell Westbrook still looms large over the first-round Western Conference matchup between the Houston Rockets and Oklahoma City Thunder.Westbrook and Chris Paul were the centerpieces in an offseason trade between the teams meant to enhance the Rockets' title hope by bringing aboard a star they could pair with James Harden, and set the Thunder's path for a rebuild after trading Paul George earlier in the offseason.Whether Houston can contend with the Lakers and Clippers at the top of the West remains to be seen after the Rockets' fourth-place finish in the conference.Oklahoma City has been perhaps the league's biggest surprise, finishing with the same record as Houston and in fifth.The teams begin their first-round series Tuesday near Orlando.Westbrook will miss at least the first part of the series with a strained right quadriceps that kept him out of four of Houston's final five seeding games.Rockets coach Mike D'Antoni said Monday that he hoped to have a better idea by Tuesday when Westbrook would be ready to return.It was Westbrook's addition to the roster which helped facilitate Houston's small-ball approach following a trade-deadline deal that sent Clint Capela to Atlanta. The trade left the Rockets without anyone taller than 6-feet-7 in their rotation.While the Rockets haven't rebounded well, unsurprisingly, with a smaller lineup, they've made up for it with defensive pressure and constant switching."Their team is a very, very physical, aggressive team," Thunder coach Billy Donovan said. "I think sometimes you look at their team and people want to look at their size in terms of their height and they discredit their length and their physicality."You've got to be able to move the basketball. You've got to be able to generate good action to try to get good shots." It's also helped that Harden has elevated his game as a defender. That was evident during the seeding games, when he led the league with five deflections per game and was second in steals."Offensively, he's as good as he's ever been, and he's been really good," D'Antoni told the Houston Chronicle. "But I just think his overall game, he's taken it up another notch from where it was." While the Thunder don't have to worry about a way to slow down both Harden and Westbrook, at least initially in this series, they might have to get creative in defending Harden.Rookie guard Luguentz Dort has quickly become Oklahoma City's top lockdown defender.He was expected to be the Thunder's primary defender on Harden in this series after holding him to 2 of 13 shooting - 1 of 11 from behind the 3-point line - and forcing two turnovers in eight minutes guarding Harden on Jan. 20.That was Dort's first career start and just his ninth NBA game for the undrafted two-way signee.But Dort is likely out for Game 1, Donovan said Monday, after spraining his right knee last Wednesday against Miami. Dort missed the seeding-game finale against the Clippers on Friday.In Dort's absence, Dennis Schroder, Hamidou Diallo and Terrance Ferguson all figure to see time guarding Harden.The Thunder won two of three over the Rockets in the regular season, though their last matchup came in that late January game.--Field Level Media
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