Well how about THAT!

From a commenter this morning "Just about every questionable call went Utah's way, and the Rockets still pulled it out. "

I for one agree with that sentiment to a large extent. I had a unique perspective on the game last night as I went into the lion's den and tried to represent The Dream Shake on MyUtahJazz's live blog. (FYI, if they do it again, can some of y'all please come over and help me? Don't be jackasses, represent the Rockets fans well, but help me keep their heads out of the clouds.) And all game there was constant bitching about the officials and how the Jazz were not getting a fair shake in the game. Let me preface the rest of this with this tidbit: I have to give them credit that when I called them out on said bitching, they did watch replays and most of the time agreed with my assessment that either the proper call was made or the proper no call was made. I too ate crow a couple of times with my mis-analysis on the replays.

Okay, with that out of the way; every fan base thinks they are getting hosed. I for one cannot look at the free throw discrepancy and believe any Utah fan could think they didn't get the better of the calls last night. In that crazy fourth quarter stretch where the Jazz were called for 3 fouls on one series, they questioned every single one (Hell I would have too if it happened to the Rockets), but every single one was a completely legitimate call and I would have been furious if any of them were not called. For CB Jack, Ron Boone and UtesFan, read it back, y'all were crazy with a few last night. I don't point this out to say that there is anything wrong with the craziness, I just find it funny how different one can see it with Red or with Hideous Blue tinted glasses on.

Anyway, the Rockets played very well and didn't make mistakes. They only had a 22 game winning streak-esque 9 turnovers. And Rafer was a huge key to the game (He still sucks, don't worry loyal Dream Shake readers, I'm not going to jinx him!), his 5 assists to 1 turnover ratio was great and was exactly what the Rockets needed. Just to insure I don't jinx him, he did end the game on a 1-5 streak from behind the arc. He only played about 3 minutes of defense on Deron Williams, but honestly, that was probably the biggest key to the game. Locking up D-Will late turned the game in the Rockets favor. I liked that he didn't overexert the hamstring and used it when he absolutely had to.

Enough has been said about Tracy here lately, but it looked to me like he figured out how to properly help the team without killing himself through the first 3 quarters. He played defense in short spurts and didn't waste energy chasing someone unnecessarily, it really was pretty impressive. His fourth quarter was actually borderline good, mind you it didn't get all the way there, but it wasn't even in the realm of horrible like the first two games. His two last shots were not good (for the horrible almost missed everything last shot that is an understatement), but his defense on the other end made up for it both times immediately following the misses.

As Dave said earlier, Luis Landry is back! The Luis part hasn't gone anywhere, but the Landry part was a sight for sore eyes. He was everywhere, getting rebounds, chasing lose balls, willing the Rockets to a victory. Jazz fans that didn't get to see him during the streak, that is almost exactly what he was like every minute on the court. I say almost because his explosiveness isn't there yet, but he finally realized that he can still hustle and help the team.

All in all, I'm not getting my hopes up too much, but this is the Rockets team I thought would win the series in 7. A guy can still hope, right? Win Game 4 and I promise to bring my We Believe sign to the game!