HOUSTON _ As If you were one of the skeptics who wondered how Houston guards James Harden and Chris Paul could play together with just one basketball, Thursday's 116-98 convincing victory over the Timberwolves in a late TNT game demonstrated one thing:
Each of them is pretty good by himself.
In his first game back after seven away injured, Harden played a measured 26 minutes and scored only 10 points _ the first time this season he hasn't scored at least 20 points_while Paul stepped forth into a leading role.
Teammate Eric Gordon shook off Harden's rust and led everybody with a 30-point night in which he heated up by scoring the first quarter's final nine points. He also provided a banked three-pointer _ his sixth of seven in the game_for punctuation at the end of the third quarter that gave Houston a 19-point lead, their biggest of the night.
The Wolves never pulled closer than nine points again, at 103-94 with 3{ minutes remaining.
Acquired last summer with a trade with the Los Angeles Clippers that he himself forced, Paul provided the pulse for a second-place Rockets team that the fourth-place Wolves are chasing in the Western Conference.
On a night when he also moved into 13th place on the NBA's all-time steals list, Paul proved pivotal in the Rockets' finishing flourish to the first half and ended the night with a 19-point, nine-assist, six-rebound, three-steal performance.
The free-shooting Rockets made 17 threes to the Wolves' eight Thursday.
Until Thursday's 3-for-15 shooting night, Harden had joined Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Wilt Chamberlain as the only ones who scored 20 or more points in each of his first 35 games to start a season.
The Wolves finished winless a two-game trip that started Tuesday at lowly Orlando. They now have lost consecutive games after they had won 12 of 15 games, including their last five consecutively before a 108-102 loss to a Magic team that had won just once since Dec. 6.
Jimmy Butler led the Wolves with 23 points while Karl-Anthony Towns' 22-point, 16-rebound game was yet another double-double.
The Rockets now are 16-0 when Harden, Paul and big man Clint Capela played together and 15-12 when they don't. The Rockets limited Harden to those 26 minutes played in his first game back since a double-overtime victory over the Los Angeles Lakers on New Year's Eve.
It didn't matter because he got help a little help from his friends, namely from backcourt mates Gordon and Paul.
Gordon turned a score tied at 17 into a 26-17 lead after a quarter, thanks to a finishing 9-0 run during the quarter's final 75 seconds in which he scored every point.
He started with a driving layup that drew a foul he converted into a three-point play. He then turned an Andrew Wiggins turnover into a three-point shot and a Jeff Teague turnover into another three and before you knew it, the Rockets had scored those nine points in a mere 30 seconds and they led by nine points.
When the Wolves started the second quarter by scoring seven unanswered points themselves, the Rockets pushed back by both getting to the free-throw line and by raining down three-pointers as they usually do.
Former Wolves forward Luc Mbah a Moute made all three three-pointers he attempted in a first half when the Rockets made nine to the Wolves five.
Paul had three threes himself and Gordon made the Rockets' other three in the half.
Paul and Gordon combined to make three consecutively that ended the first half on a 17-7 Houston run.
Leading by just three points with 3{ minutes left, Paul took over while Harden and he made all of his three threes in those final minutes when the Rockets turned a 46-43 lead into a 63-50 bulge by halftime.
Paul scored 10 of his points in the second quarter alone. The only thing he apparently didn't do was win a dance-off with Towns when Towns switched off defensively onto him and Paul used almost every move he had in an unsuccessful attempt to shake Towns.
Eventually, Paul airmailed a shot clear over the rim just as the shot-clock expires midway through the second quarter.
