On Thursday evening, the Houston Rockets will hit the road for a Christmas Day matchup against the Los Angeles Lakers. The Rockets are looking to bounce back after puzzling losses against the Los Angeles Clippers and the Sacramento Kings in their last two games, currently sitting at 17-10 on the season.
Still, not everyone is abandoning ship due to Houston’s recent rough patch.
Recently, former NBA big man Kendrick Perkins took to ESPN’s “First Take” with a bold prediction about how these two teams may fare in the playoffs in a few months.
“Offense wins you games but defense wins you what? They win you championships and that’s something that the Lakers just don’t have,” said Perkins, via First Take on X, formerly Twitter.
Indeed, the Rockets have far more capable defenders on their roster than the Lakers, especially now that Dorian Finney-Smith has been upgraded on the injury report to questionable for the Christmas Day matchup and could theoretically make his debut for Houston against his former team on Thursday.
Still, the Lakers are currently ahead of the Rockets by a few games in the Western Conference standings, having three elite offensive engines on their roster in Luka Doncic, LeBron James, and Austin Reaves, who could theoretically all three make the All-Star team this season.
The Rockets’ lack of a true point guard on their roster, which was pointed out as potential issue for the team in the wake of Fred VanVleet’s torn ACL preseason, has started to become a bit of an issue over the last couple of games, with the Rockets’ offense looking disjointed at times, despite having several elite weapons, led by Kevin Durant and Alperen Sengun.
In any case, the Rockets and the Lakers are set to tip things off on Thursday at 8:00 pm ET from Los Angeles.