LAKE GOOD VIEW, Fla. (AP) – Chris Paul and the Thunder back to the bubble wall, a more difficult position than usual to face the elimination.
This time it took a lot of storage, to prepare for a possible return home after a long absence.They were not interested in the end of their — nor of their season.
“We’re not in a position to pass yet, ” said Paul.
He made them not do it.
Paul gave the Thunder at least one more game to Disney, scoring 15 of his 28 problems in the last quarter for a 104-100 win over the Houston Rockets on Monday night in the sixth game of a first-round series in the Western Conference.
Paul made two shots on the loose with 13.1 seconds to play and the game drew at 100, and Danilo Gallinari added two more after a ball loss from Russell Westbrook.
The seventh game will take place On Wednesday night and the winner will advance to face the Los Angeles Lakers.James Harden said the Rockets’ mindset would change.
“To pass, win, ” he said. “It’s simple.”
That gives the West two games 7, with Denver and Utah in position to play his on Tuesday.
In such a tight game to the end, none of the teams led by double digits, the Thunder recovered from an eruption in Game 5 and no one handles the closed games better than Paul, who led the NBA with 150 problems in decisive situations, explained as the last five minutes of a game in which the problem differential is five problems or less.
“We expect him to take the only shots, especially late in the game,” Gallinari said.
Gallinari added 25 points.
Harden had 32 points, 8 rebounds and seven assists for the Rockets, while Robert Covington had 18 and Westbrook 17 in his game at the opposite point to a right quadriceps détente.
But they combined for 12 of the Rockets’ 22 ball losses, claiming Houston had lost more tight than Oklahoma City had won them.
“To be honest, it’s up to us,” Westbrook said.
Houston earned his top dominant playoff win in Game 5, winning 114-80 after holding Oklahoma City with a 31.5% shot.But the Thunder shook that, just as it did with a 2-0 deficit in the series.
Westbrook scored five consecutive numbers to open the third and the Rockets would get a nine-point lead in the period, but Gallinari prevented it from getting worse, then Lu Dort, a terrible 3 out of 16 in total and 0 out of nine in three problems in Game 5, had a tray and two triples for an 8-0 race he finished fourth and sent Oklahoma City to fourth place with a 77-75 lead.
Oklahoma City extended it to eight, but Houston erased it with an 18-4 streak and an 98-92 lead.Paul responded with three consecutive numbers to tie him again, and then unleashed him forever.
Most of the first part had some problems in both cases.The Thunder continued to have flaws, achieving only 41.7% overall and only getting 3 out of 15 in 3 problems.
But they defended well and the Rockets didn’t score 30 for more than four and a half minutes at the time of the fourth.Harden scored six consecutive runs in the in part and Eric Gordon scored a triple on the bell for a 51-48.Direct.
Tips
Rockets: Covington has an average of 18 years in the last 3 games after a total of 18 in the 3 most sensitive …Gordon had only nine problems in three of 12 shots.
Thunder: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander finished sixth in the voting for the Most Improved Player award, won Monday through Brandon Ingram of New Orleans.
REMEMBER A RIVAL
There was a moment of silence before the game for John Thompson, the Georgetown Hall of Fame coach who died at age 78.Oklahoma City coach Billy Donovan played against Thompson’s groups when he was in Providence in the 1980s, and lost a NIT game in his last postseason.team in 1998 after starting training in Florida.
“I definitely think the Big East back then was explained through the coaches and those guys who were such intelligent figures, and in fact Coach Thompson was,” Donovan said.”I think the things you look at, the things he was a component of, the things he did outside of basketball were, I think, amazing for the expansion of our country and the expansion of our sport.
TOO CLOSE FOR YOUR COMFORT?
The Rockets and Thunder are the remaining groups at the Grand Floridian Resort
“People have their own schedules, their own routines, the things they have to do,” Donovan said, “so you cross paths, yet it is been nice.”
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