The 1980-81 Houston Rockets were a very middle of the road team, finishing with a 40-42 record on the year. Even with a prime Moses Malone on the squad (he actually won league MVP this year), no way they were perceived as a credible threat in the Western Conference, being the last team in the league to qualify for the playoffs. These players were Houston’s largest contributors during the regular season.

Moses Malone: 27.8 / 14.8 / 1.8 / 1.9 on 5.1 rTS

Robert Reid: 15.9 / 7.1 / 4.2 / 2.0 on -1.2 rTS

Calvin Murphy: 16.7 / 1.1 / 2.9 / 1.5 on 0.8 rTS

Rudy Tomjanovich: 11.6 / 4.0 / 1.6 on -3.1 rTS

Mike Dunleavy: 10.5 / 1.6 / 3.6 on 1.0 rTS

Now at first glance, you may just think “ok, it’s not the best roster but there’s 3 Hall of Famers there, surely they would do better than below .500” but consider this: Tomjanovich was in the last season of his career (Rudy missed 30 games this season due to injury) and Murphy at 32 years old was on the decline as well. Moses and Robert Reid were the only 2 players on the roster who played at least 30 minutes per game for the season. Houston’s greatest strength, however, was that they were a legitimate 10 deep roster (10 players averaged 20 minutes per game during the regular season) which would definitely help them come playoff time. 

SIKE! The injury bug struck again for Rudy, who played just 31 total minutes of playoff basketball. Houston’s deep 10 man rotation was cut down to just 7, and they were down a Hall of Famer for the playoffs (albeit an old one). And their consolation prize for being the last team to qualify for the playoffs? They get to play the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers with Magic, Kareem, Jamaal Wilkes, Cooper, Norm Nixon, the whole squad. Now, back in those days, first round series’ were a best of 3, and the rest of the rounds were best of 7 so either team just had to win 2 games against the other to advance to the next round. Let’s see what happened… 

Houston traveled to LA to play Game 1, and it was very clear that LA had absolutely zero answer for Moses, as he dropped 38 points and 23 boards to give the Rockets a very narrow 4 point win. The Lakers were slowly chipping away from a 10 point halftime deficit, but could never close the gap. Calvin Murphy contributed 19 points off the bench. The replacement for Rudy, Billy Paultz, actually had a solid playoff debut giving 15 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 blocks on 7 for 13 shooting. Nobody on the Lakers really played bad but they just couldn’t stop Moses, and that was the deal for the next 2 games as well. The Lakers would win Game 2 in Houston thanks to a 14 point lead after 3 quarters. Moses and Murphy combined for 62 points but they couldn’t stop the firepower of the Lakers’ main 5 aforementioned players, as they combined for all but 9 of LA’s points. Game 3, the decider, was back in LA, and boy was it a rough night for Magic. He chipped in where he could, grabbing 12 boards and dishing 9 assists, but the Lakers couldn’t overcome his putrid 2 of 14 shooting night, and Houston escaped with a slim 3 point win and the series upset. They had just knocked off the defending champs. 

Their next series was against the 52 win San Antonio Spurs, headlined by George Gervin. Houston won game 1 by 9, mostly due to Gervin’s teammates having off nights from the field (he did not have the best supporting cast). Nevertheless, the teams then traded victories all the way to game 7, where Houston would win by 5 off the back of Calvin Murphy, who honestly went off all series. His 2 biggest performances though were in game 5 and 7, dropping 36 and 42 points respectively. Couple that with an 8-22 shooting performance from Gervin, and Houston had themselves a game 7 win. Moses did his usual thing averaging 28-12 for the series, but it was Old Man Murphy stepping up with 25 ppg for all 7 games to help get them to the conference finals.

The conference finals was, admittedly, fairly uneventful. It was a quick 5 game series, only one of the games was decided by a margin of less than 9 points, and Houston’s opponents, the Kansas City Kings, were actually a Cinderella team themselves. Piloted by Otis Birdsong and featuring Reggie King, Scott Wedman, and Phil Ford, they themselves had the exact same regular season record as Houston (40-42) and beat the top seeded Phoenix Suns (Truck Robinson, prime Dennis Johnson, Walter Davis) in the conference semis in 7 games. Against Houston however, they had no answers for Moses who averaged 27-15 a game, including 42 and 36 points in games 4 and 5 to close out the series. Murphy had 23 in game 3 but other than that, no more instances of a teammate going off really happened, it was mostly just Moses doing Moses things. 

And of course, in the finals Houston would face Larry Bird’s Celtics. The C’s locked down Houston defensively, they only shot 38% for the series as a team (Moses himself averaged 22 a game on 40% shooting), and the series was wrapped up in 6 games, but hey, at least Mike Dunleavy dropped 28 in game 4 👍

I just felt compelled to make this post because it seems to me that this Rockets team is the epitome of Cinderella playoff teams, being the only team in AT LEAST the last 60 years to make the finals with a losing record in the regular season, and it isn’t really ever brought up when discussing great unexpected playoff runs. Moses and Calvin Murphy in particular had great playoff runs leading up to the finals, and Billy Paultz (Rudy Tomjanovich’s replacement) shouldn’t go unmentioned as well.

Moses Malone through first 3 rounds: 28.5 / 14.1 / 1.8 / 1.4 on 2.9 rTS

Calvin Murphy through first 3 rounds: 20.3 / 1.3 / 3.6 / 1.5 on 3.6 rTS

Billy Paultz through first 3 rounds: 12.5 / 7.8 / 1.4 / 1.5 on -3.3 rTS

Now I’d like to get your guys’ take on this: Is this the most underrated playoff run in league history? And also, where does this stack up with the greatest playoff underdog stories in NBA history?

Also, I’d like to add that Moses Malone has always been very underrated. Ok, I’m done now :)

Edit: Moses actually didn't win MVP this year, he won it back to back the following 2 seasons