After suffering through their worst loss of the season in Wednesday's 39-point blowout in Milwaukee, the Rockets had little time to throw a pity party with Western Conference title contender Minnesota waiting for them Thursday night.

The Rockets looked eager to erase the memory of the debacle against the Bucks -- and didn't look anything like the team that was flattened the night before -- and enjoyed one of their best efforts of the season in an 89-83 victory at Compaq Center.

"We'll burn that tape of the last game and bring up this one when we want to be inspired," Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich said. "Coming back after a miserable game up in Milwaukee that was like an avalanche and one of those deals where I had to throw in the towel, I was really interested to see how our guys were going to respond."