Jeremy Lin charms Taiwan fans in preseason game

TAIPEI — Asian-American NBA star Jeremy Lin and teammate James Harden joined hands Sunday to help the Houston Rockets beat the Indiana Pacers 107-98 in an NBA preseason game held in Taipei, Lin’s ancestral home.

As a point guard, Lin scored 17 points in his 34-minute play while center Harden contributed 21 points in a game that drew a sell-out crowd of more than 13,000 fans at the Taipei Arena stadium.

When Lin had to quit just a few minutes before the close of the game, local fans gave him a thundering applause.

“I’m happy with the result. After all, we won. Playing (basketball) here is crazy. Fans are noisy and passionate,” Lin said in Mandarin Chinese at a press conference.

Houston coach Kevin McHale added: “The atmosphere was unbelievable. Yes, it was definitely Jeremy Lin’s home court. He played very well.”

“The last week to 10 days he’s been very, very good in our games and our practices. I think he’s really comfortable with who he is. He’s in a good state of mind”, McHale said.

The 25-year-old, whose parents are Taiwanese, has become a sporting hero on the island since he shot to stardom in the NBA with the New York Knicks early last year, sparking a global following known as “Linsanity.”

Lin, who was later traded to Houston, had a mixed performance in his first full NBA season that saw the Rockets eliminated in the first round of the playoffs.

McHale said he could understand the tremendous pressure on Lin after he swiftly rose to his fame and emerged as the basketball icon in Asia and elsewhere in the world.

“He is a great young man, he worked out very hard this summer,” McHale said, in his reference to Lin’s step-up training, including in shooting where he has sometimes struggled, after his first full-year with NBA.

NBA commissioner David Stern on Saturday hailed Lin’s success as a “true milestone,” saying Lin had been “adopted by all countries in Asia as their very own” after the two NBA team’s successful exhibition game in Manila last week.

At Sunday’s game, Paul George led the Pacers with 19 points followed by 17 points of George Hill.

Among those watching Sunday’s game in Taipei were Terry Gou, founder of Taiwan’s tech giant Hon Hai Precision and Chinese basketball icon Yao Ming, a former Rockets center.

source: sports.inquirer.net

Houston Rockets trounce Pacers

Midway through the fourth period, Omri Casspi rescued a miss with a wild tap that turned into an extra possession for the Houston Rockets. There was a drive by Jeremy Lin, there was an extra pass after an extra pass and then Casspi capped the fun sequence with a three-point play that got a lot of love from his bench.

If that was any indication at all, this could be how the Rockets will look once the season rolls along: Deeper than last season, fast and quite enjoyable to watch.

Houston started hot and stumped the Indiana Pacers with a lot of pace en route to a 116-96 victory last night in the NBA Global Games preseason match at Mall of Asia Arena.

The Rockets scored the first 12 points of the game—within the first three minutes of the opening period—and never allowed the Pacers to get any rally going to notch the victory.

“We wanted to get out to a good start,” said Rockets coach Kevin McHale. “We set some defensive goals and the first unit gave us a strong start defensively.”

The game had preseason written all over it. Both teams were far from the forms their coaches want them to be once the regular season rolls around. But there was still enough action to excite the crowd.

Fans cheered a dunk by Dwight Howard, the newly acquired Rockets center, and strong scoring finishes by Houston star James Harden. They roared when Jeremy Lin did anything at all and reserved a lot of cheers for forward Chandler Parsons, who became a crowd favorite after rumors that he went out with a popular Filipino actress.

Indiana had its share of supporters also. Paul George worked up the crowd with back-to-back treys to fuel a strong Indiana reply late in the first quarter. Danny Granger, who spent last season on the injury list, got a lot of cheers when he checked in as a sub.

But as the Rockets started to pull away, there was little reason for Pacers fans to applaud.

“Tough loss,” said Indiana coach Frank Vogel. “Houston had a lot of speed. It’s early in the season and our guys are still struggling in transition.”

Mostly, that Indiana transition defense struggled because the offense allowed Houston to run a lot.

“Our defense was phenomenal,” said Harden “We got stops, [forced] turnovers and that allowed us to get easy points.”

Vogel, though, did see something he liked: With a little more time, George and Granger could wreak havoc this season.

source: sports.inquirer.net