Rockets keep LeBron in check in defeat of Cavaliers 85 - 95

Dec 9, 2009

The Detroit Pistons had the "Jordan Rules," a defensive strategy they employed in an effort to neutralize Michael Jordan. With Cleveland coming into Toyota Center Wednesday night, Houston coach Rick Adelman once again showed off his own set of rules designed to keep Cavaliers' star LeBron James in check. Or at least limit him to mere mortal production. Call it "the King James Bible." Tag-teaming him with Shane Battier and Trevor Ariza, and then stacking the lane to discourage drives, the Rockets turned James into a jump-shooter, perhaps the main reason they walked off with a 95-85 victory before a sellout crowd of 18,200. "That's what our whole plan was," said Adelman of the defensive game plan of turning James into a jump-shooter. "Shane does a good job of trying to make him a jump shooter. (When James) attacks, he's so strong taking it to the hole, he can draw fouls and he's so big that he sees everybody on the floor.

"We just felt that if we could keep him out on the perimeter as much as we could, it would be to our advantage, and we were able to do that for the most part." Oh, James still got his numbers, finishing with 27 points - but he needed 21 shots to get that total, making only eight. It was remarkably similar to his numbers from last season's game at Houston, when, with the Rockets employing a similar strategy, James was limited to 21 points on 7-of-21 shooting. "He (James) is the best finisher in the league, so anytime you can try to keep him out of the painted area you're only going to help yourself," said Battier, who did most of the clock-punching when it came to guarding James. "That was the focus, but it's a lot tougher to do than to say. But we did a decent job tonight." Cleveland coach Mike Brown certainly thought so. "You have to give Rick Adelman and the Rockets a lot of credit," said Brown, who was ejected with 1:22 to play in the first half after picked up two technical fouls. "They played a physical game with us, and that had a lot to do with the outcome of the game." Houston had the energy to be physical and fast, having last playing at Portland four days before.

So the well-rested Rockets came out running, and the jet-lagged Cavs, who lost at Memphis in overtime the night before, simply couldn't keep up. The Rockets finished the first quarter with a 33-19 lead and never looked back. "That's where the game was (won)," said guard Aaron Brooks, who led the Rockets with 27 points. "We got our lead at the beginning of the game and sustained it throughout the (remaining) three quarters. That's just improvement. We kept running our offense. We didn't stall and hold the ball. We got good shots, and that's where the game was won." No, this game was won on the other end of the floor. The Cavaliers, who matched their season-low point total, shot only 40 percent from the floor (30 of 75) against the Rockets' swarming defense. And their big guns -- James, Mo Williams and Shaquille O'Neal -- were limited to a combined 12-of-39 shooting. Only Delonte West (14 points) and Anderson Varejao (10) managed to join James in double-figure scoring. "No one guy is going to stop Shaq. No one guy is going to stop LeBron," Battier said. "I thought our big guys did a great job of forming a wall behind the guy guarding LeBron, and just by being there it deterred some of the drives. And I thought we played really good help-side defense on everybody tonight." According to James, the biggest problem for the Cavs wasn't their shooting, but rather their carefree handling of the ball. The Cavs turned the ball over 20 times, leading to 22 Houston points. "Turnovers," he said. "You have to take pride in avoiding them, and we didn't. We just can't have unforced turnovers." While the Cavaliers' stars were struggling, the Rockets got solid production from their headliners. Brooks picked up his fourth 20-plus scoring effort in five games, and Trevor Ariza broke out of a mild slump to score 26 points on 11-of-19 shooting.

"Lately I've been struggling with my shooting, but tonight was a good night for me," said Ariza, who had made only 33.7 percent of his shots (31 of 92) over the previous five games. "I hit a lot of good shots -- open shots." Carl Landry came up with another strong effort off the bench, finishing with 14 points and solid defense around the basket in 29 minutes, and Battier also scored 14 points, adding three steals and two blocked shots to his night's work. "We didn't want to play their game," Ariza said. "If we play our game, we know we have a good chance of beating good teams." One of the few signs of life from the Cavs came shortly before halftime when Brown was ejected for arguing what he perceived to be a non-call on a drive to the basket by James. "I wanted a technical to get my point across," said Brown, whose team finished with five technical fouls, "but I took it a step too far." Despite all their struggles, the Cavaliers managed to make one last run at the Rockets. James finally put his head down and attacked the basket in the fourth quarter, scoring 13 of his points in the period. And the Cavs rallied behind him, whittling what had been an 18-point Houston lead to 71-66 on a pair of free throws by James with 9:20 left in the game. But Ariza canned a 17-foot jumper and Landry slammed home an offensive rebound to boost the lead back up to nine points, and the Rockets cruised home. "We got the game as close as five (points), but couldn't get over the hump," James said. "We needed to play with a sense of urgency earlier than we did."

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