The last time Houston won a game over Golden State, Donald Trump was still in his first term as president, the NBA was weeks away from shutting down its season due to the coronavirus pandemic, and the Warriors — not the Rockets — looked like a team destined for a full-throttle rebuild amid the collapse of its title-contending core.
Such was the state of things on Feb. 20, 2020, when the Rockets beat the Warriors 135-105 in a Chase Center still celebrating its first season. Houston had just traded away center Clint Capela at the deadline, giving coach Mike D’Antoni a veteran small-ball starting five of James Harden, Russell Westbrook, Danuel House Jr., Robert Covington and P.J. Tucker. The Warriors, with Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson already ruled out due to injury for the rest of a very much lost season, dropped to 12-44 behind a lineup of Jordan Poole, new trade acquisition Andrew Wiggings, Damion Lee, Draymond Green and Marquese Chriss.
Since then, the Warriors have won 15 straight games over the Rockets. It’s the longest active winning streak over a specific team in the NBA currently. The most recent of those victories came just six days ago, where the Warriors won 99-93 at home despite resting both Curry and Green. Golden State, however, has a long way to go to match the longest all-time — a 27-game win streak for the “Showtime”-era Los Angeles Lakers over the Sacramento Kings from 1983-1988.
The Warriors’ dominance over that time was aided in part by Westbrook’s and Harden’s late 2020 trade demands that essentially forced a full roster teardown in Houston, as well as Golden State’s resurgence with a new supporting cast behind Curry, Thompson and Green that resulted in another NBA Finals title in 2022. Now, the Rockets are finally back in contention mode with a completely new core of players capable of ending Golden State’s winning streak on tonight’s NBA Cup stage.
