The Free Throws Had One Name on Them

There is no advance billing in a road building. Nobody in Houston on Monday night had spent the week reading about this team, nobody walked in holding a franchise record, and nothing from Friday came with them. You just play, and the arithmetic finds you.

Saturday night I wrote that Dyson Daniels had taken the ball off Houston exactly once, and that I had one chance left to be wrong about him.

He took it off them once again.

One steal in twenty-eight minutes, two-of-eight from the floor. Two games against the same opponent, one steal in each, and a prediction with my name on it that is now finished. I am not going to dress that up.

What I will do is tell you the part I had right, because it arrived while I was looking for him.

Atlanta forced twenty-one Houston turnovers and scored thirty-two points off them. That is the most it has converted off turnovers in any of its four games — more than in Charlotte on the night it set the franchise record for margin. The ball pressure I spent two pieces arguing for showed up in Texas. It just did not route through the guard I named.

Houston won 120-110 anyway, and where it went was the line. Jalen Johnson attempted twelve of Atlanta's twenty-one free throws. The other twelve men who dressed attempted nine between them. Houston attempted thirty-two.

One more thing, since I asked for it out loud: Houston have beaten Atlanta twice now without Steven Adams or Marcus Smart playing a minute in either game. I kept waiting to see that team whole. I never did.

Atlanta are 2-2. Four games is not a verdict either, and this time I will remember it.