The Houston Rockets and Cleveland Cavaliers are playing live on the NBA schedule on Wednesday night and the matchup on ESPN is from Quicken Loans Arena and starts at 7 pm ET as Dwight Howard and James Harden visit the Cavs and LeBron James, although the King will be out and this is a big matchup for the Cavaliers after they lost to the Sixers.
The Cavaliers just made a trade for Timofey Mozgov after already adding Iman Shumpert and JR Smith and now the team looks poised to make a run. The Cavs have not played well overall and they have not played consistently and now they have the chance to get things together. James is out for a couple weeks and this trade can help keep things afloat for Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love for the time being. The Cavaliers are second in the central division and they are six games back of the Bulls.
Once James comes back, the team can make up that ground and the trades help, but they likely will not catch the Bulls this season if they keep playing as well as they have. Love led the team in scoring last game, but the Cavs lost to the Sixers, yes those 76ers and that could be one reason why all the trade talk finally went down with Mozgov. The team has been dying for some big man help on defense and now they have it with the Nuggets deal.
Love had 29 points and 19 rebounds for the Cavs against the Sixers and he has been playing well while LeBron has been out. The Cavs are about to have some major tests, as they play against the Rockets at home before a matchup with the Warriors on the road. Those two are two of the best teams in the NBA and the western conference and going 1-1 in those matchups would be a success for the Cavs right now with how things have been going.
The team is just three games up over .500 right now and they will be looking to get things going heading into the middle of January. The team is averaging 100 points per game and they are ranked 15th in points allowed per game and 24th in rebounding. The team reportedly is sending two first round picks to the Nuggets for Mozgov and while that price is high, it shows how badly the Cavs need improvement right now. James is leading the Cavs in scoring with 25 points per game and seven assists, while Love is tops in rebounding.
The Rockets come into the game playing well and they are 23-11 and 11-5 on the road this season. Harden is pulling the James and is leading with 27 points and six assists per game for the Rockets, while Dwight Howard has 11 rebounds per game to lead the team. The Cavaliers have lost five of six games and they have been averaging less than 90 points during that run and they are hoping to bounce back on Wednesday night after the loss to the Sixers.
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