It was 11 years ago today when All-Star center Yao Ming made all nine of his shots in the 2009 playoff opener, leading his Houston Rockets to a 108-81 win (box score) in Game 1 of the 2009 playoffs at Portland.
The 7-foot-5 big man had 24 points and and a game-high nine rebounds, while point guard Aaron Brooks led the Rockets with 27 points (5-of-8 shooting on 3-pointers) and seven assists. Luis Scola and Ron Artest added 19 points and 17 points, respectively, in the blowout victory.
Yao also made all six of his free throws, making it a perfect shooting game for the future Hall of Famer.
Limited by strong defense from the likes of Artest and Shane Battier, Portland stars Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge combined for 28 points on just 13-of-35 shooting (37.1%).
The teams entered that first-round series evenly matched on paper, with the No. 4 Trail Blazers (54-28) finishing just one game ahead of the No. 5 Rockets (53-29) in the 2008-09 regular season.
The Game 1 victory — which can be seen below in its entirety — ultimately proved crucial, since the home team won every other game in the series. By virtue of taking that Game 1 on the road, the Rockets were able to close out the Blazers with a 92-76 home win in Game 6.
That represented the first series victory for the Rockets in the NBA playoffs since the 1996-97 season, which was over a decade earlier.
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