San Antonio Spurs: Three key games in new schedule

No. 3: San Antonio Spurs vs. Houston Rockets (Jan. 14)

With the Houston Rockets’ consistent reign of dominance over the Western Conference (at least, in the playoffs), San Antonio likely never looked forward to playing its in-state rival, especially once the Spurs dropped from the same type of dominance.

However, the Rockets are in a downward spiral right now. They recently traded Russell Westbrook to the Washington Wizards for John Wall after Westbrook had made his displeasure known publicly. As of writing this, James Harden is still with the team, though he seems to be focused on an exit of his own.

While Wall is a former All-Star point guard and already has some great chemistry with new Rocket DeMarcus Cousins–whom he played with in college–there are some concerns with the trade.

Although it appears Harden prefers Wall, their styles don’t seem to match perfectly. Like Chris Paul, Wall is a ball-in-hand kind of point guard. He isn’t necessarily a volume shooter like Westbrook, but rather he’s a guy who needs the ball to play his style of game.

Wall loves to move the ball and facilitate scoring, and especially loves to run pick-and-rolls, but he can’t do any of that with the ball in Harden’s hands, as it is for most of the Rockets’ possessions.

With all of this dysfunction in the in-state rivals, now is the time for the Spurs to step up and show that they are the better, more functional team. A win over the Rockets, and a winning series against their Houston opponents, would show that the Spurs are at the tail-end of a rebuild, and would begin to establish them as the team in Texas.