[Chron] T-Mac laid out with back pain

T-Mac laid out with back pain
Rockets star is questionable for game tonight
By FRAN BLINEBURY
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle

In just over a year with the franchise, there have been plenty of times Tracy McGrady has carried the Rockets.

Friday afternoon, Rockets trainer Keith Jones virtually carried McGrady out of the locker room and into a Toyota Center hallway, where he was loaded onto a flatbed electric cart for the short ride to his car.

McGrady grinned and grimaced as he went by. The rest of the Rockets frowned with concern.

An awkward landing following a dunk near the end of practice sent McGrady limping off the court with back spasms and makes him questionable tonight against the New Orleans/Oklahoma City Hornets.

"He's our guy," center Yao Ming said. "No one wants to see him go down. It scared people. It scared me."

At this point, the medical and basketball staffs are trying not to sound the alarm.

"We're treating him for pain associated with back spasms," Jones said in a statement released by the Rockets. "We'll be treating him throughout the day and evaluating him further. He's going to get a lot of treatment today, and we're not going to know anything until (today). Obviously, it's a game-time type decision."

It is the latest in a series of physical problems suffered by McGrady since the start of training camp. He sat out the final two preseason games with tendinitis in both knees, then bruised his left knee when he collided with Dikembe Mutombo during the final workout before Wednesday's season opener. Then, he often hobbled around the floor while scoring 23 points in a 98-89 win over Sacramento.


Prone to back spasms
"He went up, he dunked the ball, he came down," said Rockets coach Jeff Van Gundy. "I didn't see much contact, if any. I don't know too much right now. I can't play doctor. He's been the victim of some unfortunate breaks so far this year as it pertains to injuries. So, we're hopeful."

McGrady, 26, has suffered from chronic back spasms throughout his eight-year NBA career and received occasional treatment for them last season, his first in Houston. He missed just four regular-season games with the Rockets a year ago, while averaging 25.7 points to lead the team in scoring and rank sixth in the NBA.

He hit nine of 21 shots in 38 minutes against the Kings, but McGrady said his bruised left knee took away his explosiveness and limited some of the things he could do. Yet he was optimistic that with rest between games, his condition would improve.

"It's just constant pain," McGrady said after the game. "It was there all of the time and it's just something that I'll have to deal with and play through until it goes away. It's nothing that I'm concerned about for the long term. Give me a couple of days off and I think I'll feel better."

Which he did, until the bad landing.


Three-guard lineup?
If McGrady, 6-8, is unable to play against the Hornets (1-1), his spot on the starting front line could be taken by Ryan Bowen, 6-9, who played seven minutes against Sacramento. Or Van Gundy might go with a three-guard lineup against the Hornets, inserting David Wesley to play with Rafer Alston and Derek Anderson.

"It's a long season," Anderson said. "We've got a lot of guys in here and, hopefully, he'll be back soon. It looked bad, whatever it was."

It didn't look any better when McGrady was carried out on the cart.


fran.blinebury@chron.com

ROCKETS SUMMARY
Do the hustle
Coach Jeff Van Gundy said the Rockets didn't eliminate their first-half mistakes in their comeback win over the Sacramento Kings in the season opener, but merely covered them up.

"In the first half, I was disappointed in that the way you overcome mistakes is in great intensity, hustle and basketball intelligence, and in the first half we displayed none of those things," he said. "In the second half, we made the same number of mistakes, maybe even more, but our intensity, hustle and basketball intelligence was at a higher rate, so it covered up for a lot of the mistakes."


Cut 'em off at the paint
Dating to last season and especially in the playoff loss to the Dallas Mavericks, the Rockets have had a difficult time keeping opposing guards from penetrating all the way to the basket or kicking the ball back outside for open jumpers.

In blowing a 22-point lead to the Hornets in the preseason, that problem cropped up again when Speedy Claxton tore them apart. Now the Rockets will get their first look at speedy rookie Chris Paul, who missed that
game.

"Those type of guys, when you play them, you still want to be aggressive, but you want to try to give them a step, where if they do burst and get ready to blow by, you still have a step to catch up with them," said Rockets point guard Rafer Alston. "You want to make those guys shoot contested jump shots, keep them out of the paint as much as possible.

"But even though those guys are fast, you don't want to back off them too far and let them see the floor."


68 percent not good
After the Rockets shot just 17-for-25 (68 percent) from the foul line in the opener, somebody asked coach Jeff Van Gundy if he was happy with the free-throw shooting.

"What type of question would that be labeled?" he said. "If I say yes, then you guys think I'm nuts and if I say no, then I'm pessimistic. Without question, everybody knows that 68 percent is very poor and could have cost us.

"And we think we should be a great free throw-shooting team."


Regular-season streak
The victory over Sacramento extended the Rockets' regular-season winning streak to eight games. They won their final seven games of last season.

The Rockets' last regular-season loss was 122-117 at Golden State on April 5.

FRAN BLINEBURY