Rockets at Wizards
The Washington Wizards will try to get a dormant offensive unit going with star point guard John Wall back in the lineup when they host the Houston Rockets on Monday. After an 88-86 loss at Orlando on Saturday, the Wizards had seen their scoring average dip to 97.2 - 26th in the NBA - and when Markieff Morris had a potential game-winning 3-pointer rim out at the buzzer it left the squad's long-range percentage at a woeful 27.2.
It also finished off a fourth quarter that saw Washington blow a 10-point lead in the final 11 minutes, something that upsets the squad whether its leader is in the lineup or not. "I think coach is pretty fed up with the way we're playing and I think he's going to start playing guys who want to play and guys who want to show up," guard Bradley Beal told the Washington Post after scoring 15 points. Wall, who is being rested on the second half of back-to-backs as he recovers from knee surgeries, will return to face a Rockets team that is 1-2 on a challenging five-game road trip. James Harden fell just shy of a triple-double (30 points, 12 assists, nine rebounds) but also had six of Houston's 25 turnovers in a 112-97 loss at Atlanta on Saturday.
TV: 7 p.m. ET, ROOT (Houston), CSN Mid-Atlantic (Washington)
ABOUT THE ROCKETS (3-3): Harden has at least 30 points and 10 assists in four of Houston's first six games and newcomer Eric Gordon has been a nice complement in the backcourt, although he was held to a season-low nine points against the Hawks. They take the bulk of the Rockets' NBA-leading 35.3 3-point attempts per game, while Ryan Anderson (15-of-36) and Trevor Ariza (14-of-37) round out the quartet of deep threats. Harden averaged 41 points while making 11-of-18 triples in two meetings with the Wizards last season.
ABOUT THE WIZARDS (1-4): Washington ranks last in the league with 14.5 points from its bench and the reserves had a collective plus-minus rating of minus-47 in the loss to Orlando. "Guys just have to start stepping up and playing," Beal told reporters. "If they want to play, coach is going to play you and if you don't, he’s going to sit you down so it's just a matter of us just being disciplined in the second group and everybody being on the same page." Wall averaged 22 points and 10 assists in the first four games of the season before getting his first scheduled night off.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. While Houston leads the NBA in 3-point attempts per game, Washington is last (18.4).
2. The Rockets have won three straight in the nation's capital.
3. Harden has at least 26 points, seven assists and six rebounds in each game, the longest such run since Michael Jordan did it 10 straight times in 1988-89.