Houston Rockets vs. OKC Thunder preseason recap: It’s raining 3s!

The Rockets started the preseason off with a bang as they defeated the Oklahoma City Thunder Tuesday night.

The Houston Rockets are back. The preseason began for the team tonight, and they definitely played some Rockets basketball. The squad won 104-97 over the OKC Thunder.

The team finished with over 20 makes from beyond the arc, an astounding amount. It was a great effort all around!

Let’s get into the notable stats:

Player statistics

James Harden – 16 points, 10 assists, 7 turnovers

Chris Paul – 11 points, 7 assists, 0 turnovers

Eric Gordon – 21 points, 6/8 from 3

Trevor Ariza – 18 points, 5/7 from 3

These were just a few of the notable performances from the players of the Rockets. In a game that saw the starts get limited minutes due to it being the preseason, they still came out and put up some great numbers.

Chris Paul and James Harden instantly had a good connection. Maybe those offseason games really paid off!

Eric Gordon was especially good and looked like his midseason form from last year.

For the Thunder, Paul George had 15 points and Carmelo Anthony had 19 points in their debuts. Melo abused his matchup with Ryan Anderson a bit, even with Ryno’s apparent commitment to the defensive end of the court.

Related Story: Ryan Anderson wants to improve his defense

Who’s ready for some highlights? Let’s take a look, shall we?

The Highlights

Let’s begin with the very first play of the preseason. It shows the instant-connection between CP3 and the Beard.

The Chris Paul era in Houston starts with a bang. #Rockets pic.twitter.com/6ymDJLQoKU

— Ben DuBose (@BenDuBose) October 4, 2017

Proving the haters wrong on the first play of the preseason! Great defense and pass to start it off. Sticking with CP3, let’s take a look at a couple of his great assists:

https://twitter.com/HoustonRockets/status/915379810842628096

https://twitter.com/HoustonRockets/status/915373082298249217

Chris Paul had several flashy passes all night yet still finished with 0 turnovers. Incredible. Also, it is nice to see the new additions Luc Mbah a Moute and P.J. Tucker gets some buckets from 3. They finished 2/3 and 1/4, respectively.

Here’s a little longer video of highlights that the Rockets posted:

https://twitter.com/HoustonRockets/status/915389702454333440

It was overall a great night for the squad. The score would have been much more lopsided if it weren’t for the fourth quarter by the G-League squad. At the end of the third, the Rockets were up 90-72. However, by the end of the game, the score stood at 104-97.

There were a ton of positives from this game. The Rockets look like a team that is ready to dominate this season. Still, it is only the first preseason game. We also cannot expect them to hit 24 shots from deep every night. The team will need to get more of an inside game going in the future.

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Next: Chris Paul will help Clint Capela greatly