http:\/\/www.bozemandailychronicle.com offers audio versions of articles using Instaread. Some words may be mispronounced.\n <\/p>\n
ATLANTA (AP) \u2014 Kevin Durant scored 22 points and both Reed Sheppard and Tari Eason had 19 points as the Houston Rockets beat the Atlanta Hawks 121-114.<\/p>\n
The Hawks nearly pulled off a comeback by cutting Houston\u2019s 20-point lead down to five in the closing moments, but Durant knocked down two three throws with 18.9 seconds remaining to push the lead back to three possessions.<\/p>\n
The win gave Houston its first 3-0 start since 2017-18, and spoiled Atlanta’s home opener after the Hawks won their first two games of the season on the road.<\/p>\n
Seven Rockets scored in double figures. Amen Thompson posted his third consecutive double-double with 17 points and 11 rebounds, and Alperen Sengun had one of his own with 17 points and 10 rebounds.<\/p>\n
Jalen Johnson sored 26 points and tied his career-high with 16 assists for the Hawks.<\/p>\n
The Rockets, who led the NBA in offensive rebounds last season, continued leaning on it as a strength with 13 offensive rebounds leading to 22 second chance points. Sheppard, a 3-point sharpshooter who shot 43% from beyond the arc last year, shook off a 1 of 6 start to his season with a 5 of 11 performance.<\/p>\n
The Hawks on the other hand were a dismal 12 of 45 from 3-point range for the night and 5 of 22 in the first half.<\/p>\n
Atlanta’s Nickeil Alexander-Walker scored 18 points, and Aaron Wiggins made a strong impression in his first home game with the franchise after coming over from Oklahoma City in a summer trade, scoring 16 points off the bench.<\/p>\n
Up Next<\/p>\n
The Rockets and Hawks will play the second half of their home-and-home Monday in Houston.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bozemandailychronicle.com offers audio versions of articles using Instaread. Some words may be mispronounced. ATLANTA (AP) \u2014 Kevin Durant…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":867217,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3776],"tags":[676,208,3874,7,677,6,446,101760,66,3261],"class_list":["post-867216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-atlanta-hawks","tag-atlanta","tag-atlanta-hawks","tag-atlantahawks","tag-basketball","tag-hawks","tag-nba","tag-nba-basketball","tag-rockets-hawks-score","tag-sports","tag-sports-transactions"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117500227286267563","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/867216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=867216"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/867216\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/867217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=867216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=867216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=867216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}