Houston Rockets Seasons
The Houston Rockets are an American professional basketball team based in Houston, Texas. They play in the Southwest Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The team was established in 1967, and played in San Diego, California for four years, before moving to Houston, Texas.
In the Rockets' debut season, their win-loss record was 15–67. After drafting Elvin Hayes first overall in the 1968 NBA Draft, they made their first appearance in the playoffs in 1969. After Hayes was traded, Moses Malone replaced him. Malone won two Most Valuable Player awards during his time in Houston, and led the Rockets to the 1977 Eastern Conference finals in his first year with the Rockets. He also led the Rockets to the NBA Finals in 1981, but they were defeated in six games by the Boston Celtics. Two years after advancing to the finals, the Rockets won a franchise-low 14 games.
In 1985, the Rockets drafted future Hall-of-Famer Hakeem Olajuwon, who led them to the 1986 Finals in his second year, in which they lost again to Boston. In the next seven seasons, they lost in the first round of the playoffs five times. They did not win their first championship until 1994, when Olajuwon led them to a franchise-best 58 wins, and the championship. The Rockets repeated the feat in 1995, but have not advanced to the finals since. They missed the playoffs from 1999 to 2003, and did not reach the playoffs until after they drafted Yao Ming in 2003. They did not advance past the first round of the playoffs for 13 years, until the 2008–09 NBA season. The Rockets won 53 games that season, advanced past the first round for the first time since 1997, defeated the Portland Trail Blazers, but eventually lost in the semifinals to the Los Angeles Lakers in seven games.
The Rockets have played 43 seasons, and advanced to the playoffs in 25 of those seasons. They have won four division titles, and have been conference champions four times. Their overall record is 1822 wins and 1754 losses.
Famous quotes containing the words houston, rockets and/or seasons:
“When your dreams tire, they go underground
and out of kindness that’s where they stay.”
—Libby Houston (b. 1941)
“The Thirties dreamed white marble and slipstream chrome, immortal crystal and burnished bronze, but the rockets on the Gernsback pulps had fallen on London in the dead of night, screaming. After the war, everyone had a car—no wings for it—and the promised superhighway to drive it down, so that the sky itself darkened, and the fumes ate the marble and pitted the miracle crystal.”
—William Gibson (b. 1948)
“The seasons alter; hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)