The Houston Rockets saw their 2025-26 season end just like the 2024-25 season, that is, with a first-round loss this time to the Los Angeles Lakers and in six games instead of seven. The Rockets entered the series as the heavy favorite, having been without Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves for the last few weeks of the regular season. The Rockets finish the season as one of the hottest teams in the NBA, and outside of Fred VanVleet and Steven Adams, who, in VanVleet's case, had been out the entire season, and Adams, who had been out for months, had the players who had played major minutes for them most of the season. That was until a day or two before Game 1, when the news came down that Kevin Durant had suffered a knee injury during practice before the Rockets flew out to Los Angeles. Durant, who had played the most games he had played in any season this decade, playing in 78 of 82 games and missing only one game due to injury, was now out for Game 1.…