Midway through the third quarter of the Rockets-Heat game on Sunday, Patrick Beverly dropped Goran Dragic with a nasty ankle-breaker, before finishing it off with a wide-open jam.
It’s almost as if they were both surprised by this particular sequence, as Dragic isn’t necessarily known as an elite one-on-one defender, nor has Beverly ever been highly-touted for his ball-handling skills. It looks like it caught everyone else off-guard as well, which is the only thing that account for how Beverly was able to drive straight down the middle for an uncontested dunk.
But Dragic would definitely get the last laugh on this one. Beverly’s highlight-reel play was one of the few bright spots for the Rockets in the second half as they squandered a 21-point lead to Miami en route to an embarrassing 109-89 loss to start the season 0-3. Neither player made much of an impact for their respective teams, as Beverly finished with just nine points, while Dragic had eight.
It was Marcus Thornton who led the way for Houston with 21 points on 50 percent shooting, including 5-of-9 from the three-point line, and it was sorely-needed as James Harden struggled tremendously all game, going 2-of-15 from the field and 0-of-10 from downtown.
After a furious second-half rally, the Heat took their first lead of the game on this Chris Bosh three-pointer early in the fourth quarter, which proved to be the only lead change of the entire contest and was the culmination of an incredible 21-1 run.
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Bosh finished with 10 points, all of which came in the fourth quarter, but it was Hassan Whiteside who led the charge with 25 points, 15 rebounds and a pair of blocks on a ridiculously-efficient 12-of-15 shooting from the floor, while Dwyane Wade chipped in 20 points, eight assists, and two steals for the Heat.
