After a long and exciting offseason around the league, everyone in the NBA world is more than ready for the regular season to start. Thankfully, the Houston Rockets played their third and final preseason game last night, finishing with two wins and one loss.
As we’re inching closer to Opening Night, I’m confident that much of what we saw in preseason will translate to the 82-game schedule. The most important part is arguably three-point shooting. It’s something that this team has desperately needed, and has hopefully found.
Based on these past three games, Bogdan Bogdanović could play a more consistent role than I previously expected. Perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise since he was Houston’s first signing, but 15.3 minutes per game is significant. He managed to launch more than five threes in each game, shooting 41.2-percent.
That will clearly give this team the floor spacing they need, as will the addition of Marcus Smart. He made four out of his nine attempts in his debut, then missed all three last night. That averages out to 33.3-percent on six attempts per game. As previously mentioned on Roundtable, he’s a very willing, but streaker shooter.
To some extent, the same things could be said about Fred VanVleet. After shooting 5/12 from deep in his debut, he only made 1/9 last night. He’ll need to shoot better than 28.6-percent in the regular season, but he clearly has the confidence to let it fly. That alone can be enough to spread the floor and open up opportunities for everyone else on the court.
Unfortunately, the same can’t be said about two players expected to be the future of the franchise. Amen Thompson shot 20-percent on only five attempts in the preseason. He didn’t even take a three-pointer in the Rockets’ first game.
Despite talks about their improved jumpshots, Alperen Şengün didn’t do much to prove that either. He only took two attempts in each of his two outings, and missed all four. Both players passed up countless amounts of wide open attempts, giving the impression that they still lack confidence from deep.
In a perfect world, their struggles and hesitancy from the perimeter won’t hold the team back too much this season. It would’ve been great to see them knocking down shots early, and is still a concern for moving forward, but the Rockets have adequately improved their three-point shooting around those two.
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