Same starters again tonight, Watson, Durant, Green, Collison and Thomas.

Seattle coach P.J. Carrlesimo said he believes Chris Wilcox isn't 100 percent yet with his right pinkie finger and still prefers to control his minutes by bringing him off the bench.

Another reason Wilcox is coming off the bench is the way Collison has played in January, averaging a double-double so far.

Seattle's game against Houston, the second of a home-and-home series, is the beginning of a seven-game home stand for the Sonics, which may help them snap the team's current 11-game home streak.

With rumblings coming from players unhappy with playing time, Carlesimo addressed the issue during his pre-game talk.

“We try to make decisions as fairly as we can. Our situation here was set up from Day 1. We’ve got a lot of guys here of comparable ability. I don’t think at a lot of positions we’ve got a head-and-shoulders situation.
It’s not like we have a first-team All-NBA guy, so everybody else that plays his position is like, ‘I know there’s nothing I can say about that. That guy’s going to get all of the minutes.’ It’s not like that here.”

Carlesimo went on to say he'll try to cut the rotation to nine guys so the people playing can get into more of a rhythm.

Also, Robert Swift could be back practicing in limited capacity in the next couple weeks, Carlesimo said.