Rockets are trending in the right direction in important statistical area

The Houston Rockets have had an interesting shooting season, leading the league in three-point percentage (42.7%) while being dead last in attempts per game (31.3). Lately, they're trending upwards in volume.

It's basic math. To win the numbers game, a team needs to take and make a lot of threes. It's impressive to lead the league in percentage, but it comes with a caveat when you're taking the fewest attempts.

Now, the Rockets are starting to launch with acceptable frequency.

Rockets are turning a corner in a key statistical area

Against the Blazers on Friday, the Rockets attempted 45 threes.

They hit 17 of them, good for 38%. That's lower than their season mark, but it's still more threes than they've hit on average (13.4) every night.

The trend goes a bit further back, too. Against the Wizards, the Rockets were 17/35 (49.0%) from deep. That's not a massive volume of attempts, but that's fine. The Rockets don't need to be a high-volume three-point shooting team. They just can't be the lowest volume three-point shooting team in the NBA.

Granted, two games makes not a viable sample size. The Rockets need to increase their volume against a wider range of teams before we can conclude that this is a trend. Still, it's encouraging.

It also correlates with another positive trend.

Young Rocket is bolstering team's three-point volume

Reed Sheppard shot 9 threes against Portland and 8 against the Wizards. That's raised his average attempts per game to 5.9 on the season.

Sheppard's confidence is clearly at an all-time high - as it should be. He's connecting on a blistering 47.7% of his threes in 2025-26. Sheppard is beginning to look like the special shooter the Rockets drafted. If his three-point volume is increasing, that's positive on several levels.

Kevin Durant is getting back to himself as well. He's launched 6 and 5 threes in these last two Rockets games after attempting 2 threes in their last three contests.

On some level, the arguable best scorer in NBA history has the right to take whatever shots he likes. On the other hand, the Rockets need Durant to shoot more than two threes every night. It seems like he got the memo.

Ultimately, the Rockets are 8-3 with the best Offensive Rating (124.5) in the NBA. This is going well. Criticizing their three-point volume is a nitpick, but the team shouldn't let good be the enemy of great (or great be the enemy of perfect). In 2025, a title contender shouldn't be attempting the fewest threes in the league.

Hopefully, that's not something the Rockets plan on doing anymore.