NBA: Playoffs-Houston Rockets at Portland Trail Blazers
NBA: Playoffs-Houston Rockets at Portland Trail Blazers Reuters

The Houston Rockets lost two home games to start their best-of-seven affair against the Portland Trail Blazers. Dwight Howard, James Harden and the rest of the Rockets have a chance to get back all the momentum and homecourt advantage if they can manage to get back-to-back wins on the road with a victory on Sunday (Monday morning Australia) in Game 4 of the first round series of the Western Conference Playoffs.

Portland took Game 1 and Game 2 to the tune of 122-120 an 112-105, respectively to get the commanding 2-0 lead in the series. LaMarcus Aldridge was more than huge dropping 46 and 43 points in those games.

Houston won the must-win game in Game 3 at Portland with a score of 121-116 (OT) last Friday. It was the turn of Harden to come up big as the much-criticized shooting guard dropped a playoff career-high of 37 markers and added 9 rebounds and 6 assists.

But the hero for Houston was an unheralded rookie in Troy Daniels, who hit a go-ahead three-pointer with 11.9 seconds to go in the extra period. Daniels ended up with 9 points even as Dwight Howard (24 points and 14 rebounds), Patrick Beverley (16 points and 9 rebounds) and Chandler Parsons (15 points) all had good performances for the Rockets.

Against the twin towers of Omer Asik and Howard, Aldridge was contained to just 23 points in the last game. The Blazers big man missed 14-of-22 shots.

Portland was led by Damian Lillard, who had 30 points, 6 rebounds and 6 assists to continue his impressive performance in his first-ever playoff series. Nicolas Batum, who missed a potential game-tying three pointer late in OT had 26 points and 9 rebounds.

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