Los Angeles Lakers vs. Houston Rockets

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By the twenty-ninth nobody can reliably name the day of the week, which is the correct state in which to attend a basketball game. A half past seven tip on a Tuesday that may as well be a Saturday, a building full of people in the same temporal fog, and a Houston side who play fast enough to wake anybody up. The last week of the calendar year is also when teams start revealing what they actually are - the early-season excuses have expired and the standings have begun to mean something. Downtown is quiet enough this week that the parking and the traffic both behave. Go while the city is still half empty and the whole thing is easy, because the first full week of January puts everything back the way it was. If you have people staying and have exhausted the obvious options, this solves an entire evening and asks nothing of anybody beyond turning up.