What Houston Rockets Need to Focus on After Firing Kevin McHale

The Houston Rockets pulled the plug on the Kevin McHale era earlier Wednesday after the Rockets began the season with a 4-7 record. Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports first reported the firing, with the team later confirming, and also announced that J.B. Bickerstaff will become the interim head coach for the team.

Houston currently sits in 11th place in the Western Conference and has been plagued with the injury bug since the start of the season as Dwight Howard, Terrence Jones, Patrick Beverley and Sam Dekker—who just recently had back surgery—have missed significant time on the court.

More concerning, however, is the friction that has arisen between the players and Houston's coaching staff. Ty Lawson said that players weren't listening to McHale during games and would run different plays than he was calling.

But with McHale gone, where do the Rockets go from here?

Bickerstaff has "no assurances" of a position on the coaching staff beyond this season, according to Wojnarowski, but has an "opportunity to earn the job on a full-time basis." Wojnarowski also named Jeff Van Gundy, Tom Thibodeau and current Charlotte Hornets head coach Steve Clifford as potential options to land the full-time position.

McHale recently signed an extension with the Rockets and—according to Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today—the team will pay McHale the remainder of his three-year deal.

Even with the interim tag, this will be Bickerstaff's first head coaching position in the NBA other than coaching the Charlotte Hornets' Summer League teams in 2005 and 2006. The players need to buy into Bickerstaff as their coach for the remainder of the season in order to turn things around in a hurry as things appear grim at this point of the season.

The Rockets have lost four games in a row as of Wednesday morning and have been one of the more disappointing teams to start this season after two consecutive seasons of winning 50-plus games. Although James Harden is averaging 27.3 points per game, he is shooting just 37.2 percent from the field, including an abysmal 26.2 percent from three-point range.

Ty Lawson, who was seen as a key player for the Rockets this season after coming over from Denver, is averaging just 8.9 points and 5.6 assists in 36.2 minutes per game.

Harden is averaging nine attempts from three-point range in the month of November and is only converting an average of 2.7 per game. With Bickerstaff in charge, Harden and the Rockets need to change their mindset of hoisting up three-point shots every possession down the court. After all, Harden is still getting to the free throw line at an average of 11.2 times per game. Harden has been the primary ball-handler for the Rockets, but he doesn't have to be with Lawson in the backcourt this season.

Lawson is one of the premier point guards in the NBA and has shown the ability to carry the weight of an offense on his shoulders throughout his career with the Nuggets. By utilizing Lawson more as a ball-dominant guard, allowing Harden to focus on scoring instead of making plays for his teammates, the Rockets should see a significant rise in field-goal percentage from both players. Furthermore, when Beverley returns from his sprained ankle, depth will give Houston's backcourt flexibility and allow for more rest for the team's key players, as Harden is averaging a career high with 38.5 minutes per game this season.

It's not too late for the Rockets to turn things around, however. Despite the injuries to the roster, the likes of Harden and Howard, along with Trevor Ariza and Lawson in support, can make this team a contender for a playoff spot in the coming months.

The Rockets are struggling on the court and struggling in a very competitive Western Conference. Firing McHale may improve the attitude of the players of the locker room for now, but only time will tell if the organization's decision to fire McHale was the right decision for the franchise moving forward.