Saturday night’s contest between the Houston Rockets and the Philadelphia 76ers saw two teams both looking to end skids.
After ringing in the New Year with a victory over a struggling Lakers team, Philadelphia had been unable to notch another game in the win column, while Houston looked to end its own streak of back-to-back losses. With a little help from a three-day break and poor defense by Houston, it was the Sixers that snapped its five-game losing streak, topping the Rockets, 107-100.
Jrue Holiday put up the first five points for Philadelphia and never looked back, finishing with a game-high 30 points on 11-of-22 shooting. The Sixers led by as much as 14 in the third quarter, but James Harden brought Houston within three with six minutes to go.
But the effort by the guard, who led the Rockets on the night with 29 points and nine rebounds, wasn’t enough as Houston missed its next eight shots to allow Philadelphia to take the win.
Jeremy Lin '10 had a +/- of +8 but failed to be as efficient as his teammates when he was on the court, only sinking two of his 13 shots for seven points. The Rockets struggled from downtown, missing 24 of 32 attempts, including eight consecutive misses in the final frame. Lin clanged all three of his treys while teammate Chandler Parsons netted only one of his seven attempts behind the arc.
With the loss, Houston, which played its fourth game in five days, falls to seventh place in the Western Conference, eight games behind the first-place Thunder.