Houston Rockets guard Fred VanVleet (5) drives past Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry (30) at the Toyota Center on Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2024 in Houston. Houston Rockets defeated the Golden State Warriors 91-90.
Elizabeth Conley/Staff Photographer
That was the prevailing sentiment among Houston Rockets fans when the No. 2-seed Rockets drew the No. 7-seed Golden State Warriors as their first-round NBA playoff opponent, the fifth postseason meeting between the two teams in the last 10 years.
The Warriors got the best of the Rockets in each of the four previous series, so the memories aren’t exactly positive.
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But this season’s Rockets team has no holdovers from the James Harden and Mike D’Antoni era squads — and none of the residual trauma.
“No. This ain’t that team, and that ain’t that team,” Rockets point guard Fred VanVleet said. “We’re a different team. They’re a different team. It’s a new year. With the acquisition (of Jimmy Butler) they made at the deadline, obviously, they’ve been on a heater. They’re one of the best teams in the league over the last few months. We understand that. Respect your opponent and you gotta go out there and lace ’em up.”
VanVleet does have some personal postseason history with the Warriors, though. In 2019, he won an NBA championship with the Toronto Raptors by beating Golden State in the finals, 4-2.
Rockets center Steven Adams, forward Dillon Brooks, forward Jeff Green and coach Ime Udoka have also each previously faced the Warriors in a playoff series as members of other franchises.
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Udoka was head coach of the Boston Celtics team that lost to the Warriors in the 2022 NBA Finals, and also coached against the Warriors in the playoffs when he was an assistant on Gregg Popovich’s San Antonio Spurs staff.
But the Rockets’ second-year coach said that vengeance isn’t on his mind going into Sunday’s Game 1 against the Warriors.
“I played them quite a few times over my years, and even in San Antonio for years, we played them regularly in the playoffs, but I don’t think anybody in this building was a part of losing to them,” Udoka said. “None of our young guys have been there, so it doesn’t really impact us directly. I might have more experience against them than most of the guys here in this building, so no different as far as that. Now, I think our guys don’t put a lot of stock in that. They weren’t a big part of it.”
On Golden State’s side, Stephen Curry, Draymond Green and Kevon Looney are the only players on the current roster who were also around for the playoff duels with Houston from 2015-19. Although none of the Rockets’ current players were part of that, they’re still relishing the opportunity to compete against a postseason juggernaut.
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Brooks and Adams were starters on the 2022 Memphis Grizzlies team that lost to Golden State 4-2 in the Western Conference semifinals, a series in which Brooks was suspended one game for committing a flagrant penalty 2 foul on Warriors guard Gary Payton II. Brooks said that gives him extra motivation for the upcoming series.
“Yeah, I lost to them so it does carry over,” Brooks said. “They’re a good team, experienced. It’s a good test for us.”
It’s a test the Rockets have successfully passed multiple times this season.
Houston went 2-3 against Golden State this regular season; four of the five games were decided by seven points or fewer. The Rockets’ 106-96 win at Chase Center on April 6 was the largest margin of victory by either team.
One of the Rockets’ most thrilling games of the season was their 91-90 win against the Warriors in the quarterfinals of the NBA in-season tournament on Dec. 11 at Toyota Center, which snapped a 15-game losing streak to the Warriors dating back to the 2019-20 season.
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The Rockets were 0-10 against the Warriors in Jalen Green and Alperen Şengün’s first three NBA seasons. So Şengün was frank about why beating the Warriors for the first time in his career meant so much to him.
“Because we couldn’t the past three years,” Şengün said. “And so, you know, at some point, you play with the madness. You play with that feeling inside of you that you want to win, want to fight, bring the fight on the court.”
Rockets third-year forward Jabari Smith Jr. said the Warriors are an important measuring stick for a young Houston squad.
“It’s kind of like the standard, almost like the blueprint, honestly,” Smith said. “The Warriors have won so many games and done so much in the past 10 years or whatever. It’s kind of like you test yourself against them. With guys like Draymond and Steph over there, who have done winning and done it at the highest level, you kind of test yourself against them to see how hard they play, and see how much you prepare. And it’s kind of like an eye-opener when you can go beat those teams, you can go compete against those teams. And it’s also an eye-opener when you can end up down plenty to those teams so quick. So it just shows how much of a complete game you got to play against good teams like that, with good veterans and well-coached teams.”
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Despite the Rockets being the No. 2 seed, the Warriors opened the week as heavy betting favorites to win the series. Brooks said the Rockets aren’t letting it affect their confidence.
“We embrace it being like that,” he said. “Overall, we don’t care what underdog or bets or the spread or whatever the case may be is, what they think. We’re the more physical team, we battle together, and I think we’re the more cohesive team.”
