Durant, Smith Jr. power Rockets past Hawks in wire-to-wire win

The Rockets never let Atlanta breathe.

Houston opens with pace and force, scoring 35 in the first quarter and immediately setting the tone with a run that starts when J. Smith Jr. knocks down a 26-foot three to push the home lead from 17-21 to 24-21. Atlanta does briefly poke ahead by five, but that’s as close as it gets to controlling the night. The Hawks trade baskets early and hang around because the ball is moving — N. Alexander-Walker keeps finding teammates, and J. Johnson’s dunk during a 10-0 Atlanta burst in the second quarter cuts the margin from 58-43 to 58-53. For a moment, the game feels alive. Then Houston answers like a contender should.

Kevin Durant is the stabilizer. He scores 25 on 60% shooting, and his imprint is everywhere in the middle stretches where the Rockets separate for good. In the third quarter, with the Hawks trying to keep the game inside striking distance, Durant buries a 9-foot running pull-up jumper as part of a 9-0 run that pushes Houston from 69-60 to 77-60. That sequence matters because it comes right after Atlanta spends real energy chasing the game. Instead of letting the Hawks turn momentum into pressure, the Rockets slam the door with shot-making. Jabari Smith Jr. is just as important in the supporting role, finishing with 23 points and 9 rebounds while giving Houston another scoring punch whenever Atlanta crowds Durant. By the end of the third, the Rockets have poured in 101 and the game has tilted into full control.

Alperen Sengun’s fingerprints are all over the box score and the flow. He posts 15 points, 9 rebounds, and 10 assists, and the assist total tells the story of how Houston keeps punishing Atlanta’s rotations. He triggers the first-quarter surge with a feed that leads to Smith Jr.’s corner three, and later he keeps the offense humming as the Hawks’ defense starts to crack around the edges. Houston’s spacing, ball movement, and size create easy layers of offense, and the Rockets repeatedly turn good possessions into open threes or downhill finishes. Even when they’re not at their sharpest, they’re hard to slow because multiple creators can initiate.

Atlanta does have one last push in the fourth, but it’s too late to change the shape of the night. The Hawks chip away from 114-83 to 114-93 behind B. Hield’s running finger roll layup off a Z. Risacher assist, and the sequence includes a couple of steals that show they’re still competing defensively. But Houston answers with its own closing burst: A. Holiday drills a 27-foot three to stretch it to 110-76 in the fourth, then I. Crawford adds a 20-foot step-back jumper with 1:43 left to make it 117-93. G. Vincent’s putback layup, C. Houstan’s running dunk, and M. Gueye’s late block all underline the same point — this one was over well before the final buzzer.

The final margin, 117-95, reflects the gap Houston created in the middle quarters more than any late flourish. The Rockets lead by as many as 34, control the glass with Tari Eason’s 10-rebound double-double, and get enough secondary production to keep Atlanta from ever keying completely on Durant. For Houston, it’s the kind of comprehensive home win that reinforces how dangerous they can be when the shot-making and playmaking line up. For Atlanta, the bright spots — Johnson’s burst, Alexander-Walker’s creation, and the late defensive activity — won’t erase the reality that they were beaten decisively on both ends. Houston moves on with momentum and another convincing display against an Eastern Conference opponent that briefly threatened, but never truly took the game away.