5 years on it still hurts like hell knowing what we had and how close we were and comparing it to where we are now we were really one game away from the finals…
As a rockets fan that game 7 was just embarrassing. We missed 27 3s in a row, no cp3 and had several missed calls and still only lost by 9pts. So many chances to climb back in, but harden simply wasn’t the leader he needed to be.
27 missed three’s. You could have built an orphanage with all those bricks. It was so surreal watching it at the time because I’ve never seen a team miss so much.
Both teams played well early in the series and put themselves in a position to win...then they shit the bed. Rockets fans bemoan Game 7 but never mention they got blown out in Game 6. Kings fans never shut up about Game 6 but seem to forget they folded in Game 7. The better team won both of those series.
@@mjwbulich in game 6, warriors just played a better game with all the momentum as rockets were impacted on cp3 going down, game 7 rockets had a chance to respond, but the 27 missed 3s, and terrible officiating made them lose, so that is valid, and same for game 6 for kings, after they were screwed out of the game, they lost lost hope and were crsuehd and feared that game 7 would be the same, you had to be there to actually know, so they are both valid excuses after all
The Prime Harden and CP3 Rockets vs basically the Warriors. The Rockets thought they are the counter to the Warriors deep three game but still ended up short
The only team that took KD’s Warriors to a Game 7. Well that probably is their highest achievement, had they won that series they’d face up with LeBron’s Cavs which was very much beatable 🗿
I watch a LOT of sports content here on RU-vid. A lot of it is basketball related, especially during basketball season. I watch many different channels, some bigger, some smaller. However, this channel is continuously my favorite channel on RU-vid by far. I'm not sure why, maybe it's the sense of humor by you guys or the production value or just your basketball insight and how personable you make the videos feel. But I absolutely love your videos, and I hope you guys never stop making them! Keep killing it!!!
Acting like they weren't beating those teams either way. Lebron beat many injured teams too but you'll complaining on one team says about how hypocrite you'll. 😆
@@BullyMaguire387 nah my dude, every team/player gets appropriate criticism from me. I don’t cherry pick fool 😂 like some people. And you thinking I just complain about one team just because I didn’t include it in my previous comment shows how ignorant you are my man
Man the 2018 rockets sure they didn't have cp3 in game 6 or 7, but that's on them because missing 27 straight 3s is inexcusable. Than a year after that, warriors with no KD just curry,klay,Draymond, and some bad role players not counting looney and Livingston and still lost.
@Bruce Deng imo comes to show Harden is not a leader because there's no way you see your team and yourself missing 3s, and you don't shoot mid-ranges or attack the basket.
Crazy how the 18 rockets lost to the warriors missing a lot of three’s then then year the kings turn around and have a similar series to the 18 rockets
I started watching right around the end of the Luis Scola era, seeing the rise from that to being that close to the Finals and then back down to where we are now is insane
Though I'm biased as a warriors fan, I feel like the 2018 game 7 was a bigger choke cause of how it happened. Like, in 2016, that game was basically a one or two score game the entire time. It was an absolute slugfest that wasn't decided until literally the last few seconds. In 2018, the rockets had over an entire half of basketball to adjust away from the three. But nah, they decided to keep shooting them and missed 27 in a row. All they had to do was drive to the basket a few times instead of jacking up threes and they probably win. shit was goofy
6:58 I would argue that Rockets (specifcally Daryl Morey + D'Antoni) started the 3 point. Yeah Curry and Thompson were insane. But Rocket's were the first team to pretty much revolve their offense around 3 pointers and layups
@@supachef_dmoney_4 Prior it was Run TMC (Tim Hardaway, Mitch Richmond and Chris Mullen) in Golden State in the early 90s with Don Nelson ironically I believe Mike was an assistant there as well That's why I knew it would work with Paul and Harden , since Richmond and Hardaway were both ball handling point guards
The thing with injuries is, ngl you can do that with basically every champion. The nuggets didn't have to see the heat with oladipo and Tyler herro. The warriors didn't have to see ja for the whole series. The bucks didn't have to see Kyrie and harden healthy with KD on the nets the whole series. Or Chris Paul being healthy. The Lakers got to deadass take several months off so AD didn't get hurt. The raptors didn't have to see KD, Klay blew out the acl, looney was playing with broken ribs, iguodala had a back injury. Deadass, go through every NBA champion. Basically all of them get some kind of injury luck
true i feel the only ones in recent years you could call luck are 2015 and 2020 one the pandemic like who saw that coming then 2015 russ got hurt in round 1 and kyrie and k love went down
@@username-mf4muI'd say that's fair for the most part. Although for 2015, the warriors were pretty young, and they were the first team in YEARS where nobody on the team had ever even played in an NBA final. Like, the thunder had kendrick Perkins, the magic had Ty Lue, then it was the spurs and nets and pistons and stuff. The warriors in 2015 might've been the first team since the 90s to win the title without having a single player on the team who had ever previously made one. To me, THAT'S pretty big. Sure, the cavs were missing some important players. But they also had LeBron James and a bunch of veterans like Jr Smith and Richard Jefferson, guys whod either been in the finals before or played for eons in the league. Those warriors had none of that. It was the first time in decades we really saw an entirely new collection of guys, a truly new squad, make it to the finals their first time, figure things out, and seal the deal. So while it was certainly fortunate that the cavs were missing guys, the cavs had championship pedigree, and it's hard to remember all the way back then cause the warriors are legends now, but in 2015 we'd done NOTHING yet, and there were still questions about whether or not a jump shooting team could win it all. The 2020 finals tho, that feels like A LOT of luck imo. I mean, c'mon, you get a several month break where you don't have to worry about injuries or travel, then when you get into the bubble, you don't have to worry about flying, time zones, checking into hotels, opposing arenas, fans, etc. There was no home court advantage or anything. And the lakers had a bunch of old guys like Dwight, Rondo, and danny green along with vets like kcp. So the lack of travel and stuff benefitted THAT team more than anyone else, cause the old guys would get more out of not having to fly and travel than a young team like the heat were at the time
As a die hard Warriors fan, my dad and I still make jokes or references about this to this day. If a team starts bricking all their threes, we call them the Houston Rockets, like game 7 this past year Boston vs Miami where Boston was bricking every three they tried.
You guys should cover the 2008-09 Denver Nuggets, the year they traded Allen Iverson for Chauncey Billups. Melo and the rest of the squad made a really good run that year and would've made the finals if not for the Kobe led Lakers. Great WCF series.
Yes, they absolutely stunk the bed during the most pivotal game..but just the fact that they even pushed the NBA equivalent of the damn Monstars to 7 is still crazy as sht.
I wonder why Dantoni never got any of the hate that Doc Rivers gets because at least Doc went went to the finals and got a chip. Dantoni hasn't even gone to the finals. If Dantoni's offense was so good and ahead of its time, why has his teams always lost to the same teams(Spurs:when he coached Phoenix, Heat:When he coached the Knicks, and Warriors). Or teams that do his style of play but a lot better.
I feel like the only reason why he gets a pass and Doc doesn’t is that docs teams are usually overwhelming favorites and at times blow 2-0 leads while Dantoni has ran into historic teams like Golden State, Spurs, and Dirks Mavs.
Dantoni hasn't blown as many 3-1 leads and most people do believe his offense is gimmicky and does get criticized for his defense. without a good defense a revolutionary offense ahead of its time can only do so much. Doc was hyped as a championship level coach on the same level as pop, phil and kerr despite his only championship coming off a team with one of the worst win-loss percentages for a championship team. Dantoni is not regarded as seriously and people know what he brings to the table. But Doc is considered an example of excellent coaching with infuriates fans given his blown leads in the playoffs. And despite his offense being ahead of its time, the personnel to execute it didn't really have a true superstar during the Suns days. If he was given the warriors roster from 2016-2019 then there would be more talk about him. Sometimes a superstar will boost your legacy tremendously like Ty Lue with Lebron and Bud with Giannis. We all know how bad Bud's halfcourt offense is but the talent of Giannis has carried him. Most of Dantonis teams didn't have the star power and names some of Docs have. Doc has had the privilege of working with the Celtics big 3 + rondo and competent role players, Lob city and Kawhi and PG but out of all the seasons only got 1 ring. In recent years more people have credited their offense to PP and Ray Allen all being elite shooters and Rondo an elite passer with insane court vision, while on defense it was Thibs making the defensive schemes and KG anchoring the defense along with role players like Tony Allen and Kendrick Perkins.
He also get criticized. I remember him as no ‘D’antoni and putting much pressure into the minutes of Kobe that probably led him to his injury. RIP Kobe.
Chris Paul was healthy for games 1 and 3 of that Warriors series-Rockets lost. Saying Houston would have won the title if not for the hamstring is an oversimplification of how playoff series are played
Addition to this, they have a similar build in 2020 season and they were dominant until in the bubble. Unluckily they faced the Lakers with AD which effectively is the needed big man to defend the 3 and switch. But if they face like the Nuggets, I believe they can go until WCF.
2004-05 pacers next-ish? People forget how stacked that team was and if it wasnt for *the incident* that team might’ve cruised to the championship Edit: said cursed instead of cruised lmao 💀
I think this team really lives as an example of just how many things have to go your way to win a championship in the nba this one hurts as a rockets fan
one thomas was off that hip injury and was traded to clevland and sucked in 18 and cp was easily the best passer and floor general in the league better than steph no but better than kyrie who as injury prone this year and still is
@DJ missing a floor general or not missing 27 straight 3s and kept shooting them is inexcusable. You would think your superstar or your coach will tell you to attack the basket or do better plays.
@@kinglightning5256 well yes I agree mike dantoni should have stepped in and made adjustments but they depended on Paul to set up there buckets and hit them the offense flowed through him he generated most of there points with his elite passing when you take away a center piece in how the offense flows it messes it up.
The 2012 Thunder, the 2018 Rockets, and the 2021 Nets... Harden has been a part of 3 of the best teams to never win a championship. Had he stuck with one of these cores for longer, he would have had a ring.
Injuries ALWAYS dictate who wins it all. Even the two times the Warriors lost injuries played a huge factor. Raptors got the biggest bump when the Dubs lost Durant and Klay in the finals. And when they blew the 3-1 lead they didn’t have Draymond and Steph played through an injury. But those will always still count, because injuries are part of the game. Health is a huge attribute to a player. You can’t “asterisk” the other team because you signed injury prone players.
This is prob gonna get a lot of hate but being from Cleveland, I felt like Lebron especially in 2018 could’ve beat any team except the warriors in those playoffs.
I’m gonna with the Utah Jazz pretty much all of the 90’s, they had 2 MVP Caliber players in their prime having record seasons and made it to the finals in 97’ and 98’. But as we all know, Michael Jordan, so 🤷♂️
@@zomboss-xb1st He had seasons dropping 17 and 14, if Steve Nash can go back to back with 15 and 14 points 10 years later while contributing less to his team, then John Stockton can win MVP
@@zomboss-xb1st 1st team all defense also being the facilitator the offensive abilities of a 2 time MVP competing against Michael Jordan, cause he couldn't do that without Stockton(see the Lakers)+ Bringing his team to the finals twice>Everything you just said All of that means nothing if the Jazz can go 64-18 with those two and Nash and Stoudemires 61-21 isn't even the best record in their franchise. Barkley was more effective than the "Legendary Offense" you cling to.
Rockets fan here. I get we missed 27 threes in a row but the refs lost us game 7 just as much with all of the missed calls on the warriors, and I stick by that
@@RealJMCproductionsNeither Harden nor CP3 played up to the same standard that they did in 2018. They also lost depth with no Trevor Ariza or Mbah a Moute to juggle on defensive switching. Roster doesnt always indicate consistency, a year makes a large difference.
In my humblest of opinions, and based on over 40 years of watching NBA basketball, I think that the Clyde Drexler era Portland Trailblazers are the greatest NBA team to never win a title.
