Everything Wrong With the Rockets' Blowout Loss to the Nuggets

The Houston Rockets suffered their most embarrassing loss of the season on Wednesday night, falling to the Denver Nuggets on the road, 129-93. Before that, their biggest margin of defeat came on March 8 in a 145-120 loss to their in-state rival, the San Antonio Spurs. Just three days later, that was topped in Colorado.

The 36-point loss had so many things wrong that go beyond poor offense. Not hitting 100 points in 2026 is disappointing, but the Rockets also nearly let up 130 points. This could have been a statement win, but it went south after they were down just six points at halftime. Here are three things that went wrong for Houston:

Three-Point Shooting

The farcical aspect of the Rockets' perimeter shooting woes is that they actually got great opportunities to knock down shots; they just couldn't get anything to fall. Houston attempted 33 three-pointers, one more than the Nuggets, yet only managed to hit four.

The Rockets also grabbed a miraculous 16 offensive rebounds, but couldn't capitalize on opportunities. Denver would often leave guards such as Amen Thompson, Tari Eason and Josh Okogie open. Okogie was the only player to hit more than one shot from beyond the arc.

Kevin Durant's Lack of Involvement

The blowout came early in the second half as Houston was outscored 40-22 in the third quarter, so Durant wasn't expected to play much of the fourth. The 37-year-old recorded just 26 minutes, putting up 11 points, four rebounds and five assists on 5-for-8 shooting from the field.

Durant was efficient, which only makes it more perplexing that he didn't get opportunities to shoot more. But this has been the problem with the Rockets for most of the 2025-26 season.

When the 6-foot-11 sniper isn't taking over games, the rest of the offense sputters almost all the time. Houston has nearly failed to give him the proper supplementary production, rather than leaving it to Durant to carry the scoring load. Amen Thompson led the team with an efficient 16 points while going 8-for-14, but the bench put up 37 points on 31.3% shooting.

Perimeter Defense

On the defensive side, the Rockets were never going to stop Nikola Jokić, but they did make it tougher for him to score. The Serbian superstar managed just 16 points, 12 rebounds and 13 assists while attempting just 12 shots.

The real issue came from the perimeter, as I noted in the preview. Jamal Murray, who has tormented Houston before, led the game with 30 points. The Nuggets knocked down 17-of-32 three-point attempts, which simply cannot happen if you boast ball-stoppers like Thompson and Eason.