Lakers' Ron Artest Returns to Houston

There are 10 games on the schedule this evening, but perhaps none holds more intrigue than Ron Artest making his return to Houston, to face the Rockets as a member of the Los Angeles Lakers.

But Artest isn't the only one with something to prove, as L.A. will be seeing Trevor Ariza for the first time since his agent played hardball with L.A.'s ownership group over the summer.

It's a little early to tell which team has come out ahead in this virtual trade, but looking at tonight's matchup, the Rockets would appear to be the ones with the advantage.

Houston is out to the same 3-1 start as the Lakers are, which is pretty incredible considering that most people didn't expect a team without its two biggest stars (Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady) to be able to put up enough points on most nights to win games. But not only are the Rockets scoring, they're doing so at a clip of almost 110 points per game over their last three.

So where is the scoring coming from? The one-word answer, obviously, is "everywhere."

In their last outing -- a dominant offensive and defensive performance in a road win over the Jazz -- Houston had eight players score in double figures, without a single one of them cracking the 20-point mark for the game. They did this with incredible ball movement, and by always making the extra pass to simply turn good looks into great ones.

The Lakers, meanwhile -- save for an 18-0 run in the third quarter over the Atlanta Hawks on Sunday -- have looked very pedestrian to open the season. The team pulled out an overtime win in Oklahoma City on Tuesday, but that had more to do with the Thunder's ineptness in crunch time (offensively) than it did with the Lakers' flawless execution. Too many plays late involved Kobe Bryant going one-on-five, and with Thabo Sefolosha playing lock-down defense, most of those possessions ended badly, and were a nightmare to watch.

Back to Ron Artest, who, as you might recall, seemed to be looking for reasons to hold a grudge against his former team back in April. The money quote from his Twitter diatribe was, "Houston did me dirty. I can't wait til next year when we go to Houston. I'm not shooting. All defense. Somebody getting locked da f**k up."

In this case, that somebody will likely be Trevor Ariza.

Artest hasn't fit in well yet offensively with his new team, but he has been able to lock up his man for stretches, especially during the last two games. Joe Johnson of the Hawks torched the Lakers for 18 points in the first quarter on Sunday, but when L.A. made that big run in the third, Artest was the one who was guarding Johnson, and he shut him out in the period.

On Tuesday against the Thunder, when Artest was on Kevin Durant, all of the shots were highly contested, and he even forced Durant into more than one airball, which is a testament to just how tough Artest was making it on the third-year stud.

Ariza has been better-than-expected offensively as a Rocket, shooting over 47 percent from the field and 52 percent from three-point land through the first four games. He even had a 33-point game in a win over the Blazers, something that surprised Artest when he heard about it.

"He had 33?" asked Artest with a surprised tone. Then came a grin. "That's great. I didn't know he could score 30."

Oftentimes, when two high-profile players are involved in switching teams, the game doesn't come down solely to the matchup between those players. But tonight in Houston, the winner of the Artest vs. Ariza conflict is likely to give his team a huge edge, and one which could ultimately help decide the game's final result.