Flickering FLAME

HOUSTON —  Old Rockets never die, they just fade away . . . eventually.

Clyde Drexler is thinking about retiring after next season. Charles Barkley has been talking about it for years, only now he sees the kids trying to run both Western Conference finalists straight to the convalescent home. Only one member of the playoff rotation is younger than 33, point guard Matt Maloney.

Meanwhile, all these Rockets have done is quickly dispatch one of the young guns, the Minnesota Timberwolves in a three-game sweep in the first round, then bump off the defending conference champion Seattle SuperSonics, then rally from a 0-2 deficit against one of their few contemporaries, the Utah Jazz. The American Assn. of Retired Persons may have them on the mailing list, but they’re still the NBA’s problem for now.

A Jazz victory Tuesday was worth a 3-2 lead. Of course, it also put Utah in the cross hairs as Game 6 comes to the Summit, seeing as no team has so regularly gone so far behind enemy lines and lived to tell--the Rockets are 11-2 in elimination games since Rudy Tomjanovich became coach in February 1992. That includes one stretch of eight consecutive victories.

“I just think it’s a characteristic,” Tomjanovich said. “Like being a boxer coming out of the corner. The thing that kind of gets to me is, why do we have to get in that damn corner?”

Because they wouldn’t be the Rockets otherwise.

The title run of 1994 included coming back from 0-2 in the second round against the Phoenix Suns and needing a Game 7 victory, then rallying from 2-3 in the finals against the New York Knicks by winning the last two at home. In ‘95, starting the postseason from the No. 6 spot in the West, they won a Game 5 in the opening round to advance, next recovered from 1-3 by winning Game 7 at Phoenix on Mario Elie’s three-point shot, and then went on to another championship.

Along the way, the great Hakeem Olajuwon, joined with Tomjanovich as the constant, has been surrounded by an assortment of CBA claimers or veteran pickups unwanted by others, moves usually born from the desperation of injuries. It was not unusual last season to have two or three such refugees in the starting lineup at the same time. It also was not unusual to have many work out.

Come 1996-97, Maloney, two years removed from Penn and one from the Grand Rapids Mackers, was brought in to battle for the backup job at the point, then started every game because of injuries to projected No. 1 Brent Price and became a second-team all-rookie choice.

Eddie Johnson, traded by the Indiana Pacers, cut by the Denver Nuggets, considered retirement, instead signed as a free agent in March, then scored 31 points in Game 3 against the Jazz and won Game 4 with a three-point basket at the buzzer. Sedale Threatt opened the season in France and was about 20 pounds overweight and still rehabilitating his surgically repaired knee when signed as a free agent two days before Johnson, but has done a decent job as Maloney’s backup.

“I paid attention to this team over the last few years,” Johnson said. “I study the league and I’ve noticed what they were doing. They would always take chances on guys and they’d always try to find ways to fit guys around Dream. I knew this was a perfect fit for me. They didn’t have to tell me that. I knew.”

Said Price, who left the Washington Bullets last summer to sign with the Rockets as a free agent, and not because there were no other options: “The first two championships they won, I remember different guys hitting big shots. That was something that intrigued me. When I got here, I could see it’s because of the atmosphere that’s created by Rudy, the whole organization that really does make it a whole team, family concept.”

Like one big retirement home. Drexler, Barkley and Kevin Willis are 34. Olajuwon and Elie are 33. Johnson is 38, Threatt 35. The Jazz may be known as a veteran team, but seven Rockets have as many or more years of pro experience as Utah’s elder statesmen, John Stockton and Antoine Carr.

“We don’t care about people saying we’re old,” Barkley said. “It’s just the truth.”

So is this: Only three other teams got as far.

Houston had a roster overhaul and a run of injuries, forcing it to break in a new starting point guard, an NBA rookie at that. The Rockets, juggling lineups all season, also finished fifth in scoring and seventh in shooting. They won 57 games, tied for second best in the conference and fourth best in the league.

Beginner’s luck, it isn’t.

“Let’s be realistic,” Barkley said. “This is probably our last chance, probably Utah’s last chance to win the championship. I know people have been thinking that every year, but I think this is the last chance for us and Utah.

“It’s a young man’s game. Obviously, every year you lose something. Clyde has lost something, Dream has lost something, I’ve lost something, and we’re going to lose more next year. If by some little stretch of the imagination the Lakers get some common sense over the summer, they’re going to be the team to beat. The future’s in Minnesota and Seattle.

“When you’re 25 or 30, you don’t get tired. You don’t ever get sore. But now I have to work so hard to accomplish so little. If I’d have worked so hard as I do now when I was 25, I’d have averaged 30 points and 20 rebounds. But that’s part of growing up and maturity. When you’re 25, you take it for granted.

“Playing against a [Sean] Kemp, a [Tom] Gugliotta, a [Kevin] Garnett, these guys are really talented. Now, you catch yourself saying, ‘Did I used to run that fast and jump that high?’

“They’re younger teams. This year, it’s taking everything we’ve got to try to get to the finals. The same for Utah. For Eddie Johnson, myself, it’s our last hurrah.”

Or maybe it isn’t.

“I’ve been hearing that for a long time,” Drexler said. “But not about this team. That’s the first time I’ve heard it. And I disagree with it.

“This is the first year we’ve been together. How can it be the last stand?”

Especially since they don’t make last stands like they used to. The spring of ’96 was supposed to be it for the Jazz, remember, good enough to get to the final minute of Game 7 of the conference final on the road, but not good enough to get over the hump. And then, 64 victories this season, a franchise record.

Even in his worst moments, Olajuwon will still be a dominating center in 1997-98. Price, recovering from a torn knee ligament, will be back. Barkley has gone so far downhill that, despite shooting struggles in the last two rounds, he’s only averaging 17.7 points and 12.3 rebounds against a Kemp, a Gugliotta, a Garnett, a Karl Malone. And Drexler will be coming off a season in which Western Conference coaches were still so impressed with what remained in the tank that they voted him to the all-star team.

So don’t hold a spot for them in the lottery. But there is no doubt, of course, that the final sands are dropping through the hour glass. Drexler, for one, is clearly thinking that 1997-98 will be his last stand, one way or another.

“Next year will be my 15th year,” he said. “What a great number. I’m very fortunate to play such a great game for so long, and [stay]relatively healthy. That’s a big key. If I can remain healthy the rest of this year and next year, then I’ll take a long look at it.”

If he hasn’t started to already.

“It’s crept into my mind,” Drexler said, “simply because you can’t play forever.”

Not even if you’re a Rocket.