Ime Udoka was direct and unapologetic on Friday night after a loss against the Minnesota Timberwolves: Houston’s offense was fine, Houston’s defense was not, and allowing 136 points to end an eight-game winning streak is not a template the Rockets can bring into the postseason.
The core issue, Udoka said, was a complete inability to guard anyone one-on-one for most of the night. “All game it felt like it was just layup line — pretty much all their guys put their heads down and got to the basket at will. Even with the 10-point lead, our defense wasn’t good enough. We had 73 at halftime, they had 69. We’re scoring no problem but didn’t put up much resistance on the other end,” he said.
Udoka eventually turned to zone defense in the fourth quarter in an attempt to slow Minnesota’s drives. He acknowledged the adjustment helped to a degree. “It halted some of their drives, but they hit some tough threes — 15 for 30, 50% — though a lot were contested off the dribble that you can kind of live with. It did a good job at least turning them from getting to the basket like they were,” he said.
On Amen Thompson’s career-high 41 points — a performance built almost entirely on relentless aggression at the rim — Udoka framed it as a symptom of a wider defensive problem rather than a single matchup issue. “He’s attacking the basket pretty much at will. He did what five of their guys did — step to the basket consistently, put pressure on the rim, then make the right reads when he gets there,” he said. “We just had to play better defense overall as a team, one-on-one.”
Houston shot just 4-of-19 from three on the night, a figure Udoka addressed honestly. “We got some decent looks. We’d like to get more, especially with them packing the paint going after Alperen and Kevin. But we got to the basket a ton — almost 70 points in the paint. We missed the good looks we had, just didn’t get enough attempts,” he said.
Closing with a big-picture assessment of what the loss means, Udoka was blunt. “Tonight it just felt like open gym. Both teams going back and forth, scoring too easy. We don’t want to be in a shootout every night. We feel if we’re scoring, we should be able to put up some resistance on the other end. And 136 is way too high,” he said.
Houston remains the fifth seed in the West at 51-30 and hosts Memphis on Sunday, with Udoka hinting that rest could be on the table if the seeding picture is settled before tip-off.
