Hornets Hit the Floor Thursday Night Looking for Another Statement Win vs. Rockets

Suspensions, off-the-court drama, and two good teams

Erik Williams-Imagn Images

For a lot of teams, both those that are great and those that are terrible, the post-All-Star part of the regular season is very much not exciting. They simply wait until the playoffs or the offseason inevitably arrive.

But alas, the Charlotte Hornets and Houston Rockets are neither great nor terrible. And even if they were, they've made sure to generate plenty of non-basketball-related news before today's 7pm EST matchup at Spectrum Center.

A look at the injury report will hint at some of those:

Hornets: OUT: Moussa Diabaté & Miles Bridges (Suspension), Coby White (L Calf), Liam McNeeley (L Ankle)

Rockets: OUT: Steven Adams (L Ankle), Fred VanVleet (R ACL), Tristen Newton (G League)

The Hornets will again be without Moussa Diabaté and Miles Bridges, who have still got three games left on their suspensions stemming from the brawl against the Pistons about a week ago.

A name you'll be happy not to see on the injury report is that of LaMelo Ball. The star guard and offensive centerpiece was involved in a car crash in Uptown Charlotte yesterday, but seemingly sustained no injuries.

Glad to know both LaMelo and the other driver got out of the car quickly and nobody was seriously injured. That’s all that really matters here. https://t.co/rtlaeOnnAL

— Matt Alquiza (@malquiza8) February 18, 2026

Today's opponent: The Houston Rockets (4th in the West)

Houston was already having some problems of their own heading into the All-Star festivities, which we will get into in a second. But on Sunday, hours before the All-Star Game, a completely different and unique issue arose.

On an on-court heater and an off-court burner: Kevin Durant keeps making headlines in all kinds of ways. | Erik Williams-Imagn Images

Screenshots of messages from private X (aka Twitter) groups made their way onto the social media platform. They included texts from an account allegedly run by Kevin Durant, in which both past and present teammates of the superstar were criticized and insulted.

The emphasis has to be on allegedly there, because even though the circumstances and some of the information conveyed in the texts make it seem possible, there is far from any conclusive evidence that the responsible account actually belongs to Durant.

But there was enough in that story for it to catch fire quickly online, and eventually, a journalist ended up asking "KD" about it during media availability. This was his response:

Kevin Durant today at Rockets practice:

“I’m not here to get into Twitter nonsense. My teammates know what it is, we’ve been locked in the whole season.” pic.twitter.com/tX3vMtdBGV

— Kelly Iko (@KellyIko) February 18, 2026

Key to the game: Don't allow second chances

Durant may be harming the Rockets off the court, but he is keeping them together by himself on it. Still mostly his usual self, he is pouring in 25.8 points per game on admirable efficiency. But apart from him, it's an offensive trainwreck.

Alperen Şengün, Amen Thompson, Jabari Smith Jr., Reed Sheppard, and Tari Eason are also scoring in the double-digits, but they're doing so both inconsistently and inefficiently. That sounds bad enough, but if they're not getting that, they usually get nothing.

The ACL tear to Fred VanVleet before the start of the season has left the team without its best playmaker and a much-needed scoring option. After the aforementioned names, the next biggest offensive threat would probably be Aaron Holiday or Josh Okogie.

BUT!

Even though they can't make shots and have a very small scoring hierarchy, there is actually one thing the Rockets do well offensively. They rebound the ball a lot. Now, you might say that is a given when you miss as much as they do. And you'd be correct to a certain extent.

Yet none of the teams with similarly bad field goal percentages are even close to rebounding as much as Houston. Even without Steven Adams, who went down a couple of weeks ago, they are getting back 36.7% of their misses.

Led by Moussa Diabate, the Hornets did a great job at securing defensive rebounds in the only other matchup on February 5th. They won the battle on the boards 46-40 en route to a 109-99 victory. With the Frenchman unavailable today, someone else has to step up.

Projected Starting Lineups

	Hornets	Rockets
Point Guard	LaMelo Ball	Amen Thompson
Shooting Guard	Kon Knueppel	Kevin Durant
Small Forward	Brandon Miller	Tari Eason
Power Forward	Grant Williams	Jabari Smith Jr.
Center	Ryan Kalkbrenner	Alperen Sengün