Russell Westbrook on Sunday scored 31 points and James Harden added 24 to rally the Houston Rockets over NBA overall leaders Milwaukee Bucks 120-116, despite a big night for Giannis Antetokounmpo.
The Bucks led 112-104 after Khris Middleton’s three-pointer with three minutes, 14 seconds to play, but Houston closed the game with a 16-4 run.
“It’s amazing,” Westbrook said. “We fought through. Adversity showed up and we showed off. All the guys in our locker room showed up to play for 48 minutes.”
Photo: USA TodaySports / Mike Ehrmann / Pool
The Rockets went 21-of-61 from three-point range, matching an NBA record for the most three-point attempts by a club in a non-overtime game, with Danuel House hitting four and Harden among five other players who landed three from outside the arc.
“You have to make the right reads and trust your teammates and that’s what I tried to do all night long,” Westbrook said.
The Rockets also rallied from seven points down in the final minute to defeat the Dallas Mavericks on Friday.
Westbrook, on a career-best run of 36 consecutive games with 20 or more points, hit 10-of-21 from the floor, 1-of-3 from beyond the arc, and 10-of-12 free throws. Harden had six steals, seven rebounds and seven assists.
“We’ve got to keep executing at the end of close games,” Antetokounmpo said. “We weren’t able to do that. We’ve got to find the open man and hit more shots.”
In other games on Sunday, it was:
‧ Celtics 128, Trail Blazers 124
‧ Nets 118, Wizards 110
‧ Magic 132, Kings 116
‧ Spurs 108, Grizzlies 106
‧ Suns 117, Mavericks 115
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