video: Jeremy Lin dishes, then sets table for self in Rockets’ win

Video of entire game,
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wc1pspK4AZM&feature=youtu.be]

Jeremy Lin had already reached double figures in assists when he began a drive like many others throughout the night to find something had changed.

He had been moving deliberately through the lane, often across the lane, finding open teammates. Kevin Martin had continued his sharp-shooting of the preseason, hitting 8 of 11 shots to score 22 points. Patrick Patterson had gone from a 1-of-5 start to make six of his remaining seven shots, scoring 17.

With the shooters around him hitting open looks, Lin made his way down the lane to see something he had rarely seen in his previous three preseason games: room to move. With Memphis defenders forced to stay with their assignments Lin finished the drive and then another. The Rockets offense had gone from running in mud to rolling to its best performance of the preseason and a 109-102 win Wednesday over the Grizzlies.

“Coach made a point of letting everybody play off of each other instead of the other night in the third quarter (in Dallas) where we were just trying to do too much one-on-one and not working the other side,” Martin said. “It snow-balled from there and kept on going throughout the game.”

Martin carried the Rockets offense early, as he had through his previous four preseason games, but continued to get good looks through his 32 minutes. Martin is making 61 percent of his shots in the preseason, averaging 18.3 points.

“Just moving around,” Martin said. “I know where my spots are. I can read the defense, just take what they’re giving me.

“If everybody is shooting well, the man who is guarding you tends to stay a little closer to you. It kind of opens up the middle. If I’m hot, my man will stay with me in the corner. If Pat’s hot, his man will stay with him at the top of the key. You have a lot of room.”

After that got the Rockets through a slow start, it also began to create openings for Lin, first to probe the lane looking for playmaking opportunities and then to finish a few drives. He still has not found his perimeter touch, making just three of nine shots, but he had 12 assists, five rebounds and four steals in 31 minutes.

Overall, the Rockets made 50.6 percent of their shots, including 70.6 percent in the third quarter when the Grizzlies starters (other than Tony Allen, who had the night off), played much of the quarter.

“We still get sticky with the ball at times,” McHale said. “We still have guys that don’t move the way they need to move, but we got to catch and move the ball. We have to attack quick. We have to have action to create our separation. It’s coming.”

Lin especially showed signs of playing with greater comfort and confidence playmaking in the lane and on the break.

“We were hitting shots today, not me personally, but everybody else,” Lin said. “They kind of had to stay out a little more and think twice about dropping all the way down. That opened things up to get in the middle. Once you get in the middle, it’s all about making quick decisions. You’ll probably get something good if you get to the heart of their defense.

“Me and coach talked about making the easy, simple play with a high possibility to succeed. That’s what we try to focus on as a team, just swing, swing, find the open guy and let the ball find the person that’s supposed to take that shot.”

It looked as simple as the layups that finally came after all those passes led to all those open shots, and Lin had his most effective game even without hitting his outside shots.

“I just told him to slow down,” Chandler Parsons said. “I said, ‘You’re a great player; just don’t worry about the outside. Just play basketball; you’ve been doing it your whole life.’ In the second half he really slowed down. He distributed well. He looks up the floor and gets us easy buckets a lot. It’s not about points. It’s just how he can lead our team on the offensive end and it’s about us winning, and the way he played tonight helped us win.”

via Ultimate Rockets » Lin dishes, then sets table for self in Rockets’ win.