NBA PLAYOFFS : Clyde’s Home Cookin’ Has Houston in Feeding Frenzy : Western Conference: Drexler rediscovers his youth after trade reunites him with Olajuwon on Rockets.

Here it is, 3 o’clock, and the lunch rush shows no sign of subsiding.

Drexler’s Bar-B-Q, corner of Gray and Dowling, is a good bit of food in a bad part of town. Beef, links, beans, slaw. Fourteen years now they’ve been serving it up, just never like this.

“It’s really different,” said Eunice Drexler Scott, who oversees the operation. “Besides, I recently remodeled the place to make it bigger. But now, it’s greater. A lot of it is attributed to him being back.”

That would be Clyde Drexler, her son. He came back Feb. 14, traded after 11 1/2 seasons as a Portland Trail Blazer to the Houston Rockets, where he was reunited with a player, Hakeem Olajuwon, and a city. Back to his hometown.

“Business booms more when we win,” Drexler Scott said.

They last joined forces in the best known of all University of Houston fraternities, Phi Slamma Jamma--two future NBA superstars on the same college team, seconds away from an NCAA championship, only to have the brass ring stolen by an airball that became Lorenzo Charles’ rebound dunk for North Carolina State.

The Dream dreamed of a moment like this, he and Drexler together again, running down a title at the next level. Not that the NCAA championship game stayed with them. They spoke of it only once or twice . . . a month.

“We talked about this for many, many years,” Olajuwon said. “My reaction when I heard about the trade was, ‘Too good to be true.’ ”

But all was not happily ever after in this storybook tale. Vernon Maxwell, unstable on his best days, fretted over the arrival of a new shooting guard. Robert Horry, asked for his reaction to the deal, said: “I hate it.” At least Mario Elie, no Drexler supporter during their days with the Trail Blazers, took the diplomatic route.

Said Drexler: “I had a couple guys who were indecisive.”

Primarily, most Rockets were upset that the nucleus was torn apart before they even had a chance to repeat. They were 29-17 when starting power forward Otis Thorpe was sent to Portland for Drexler and Tracy Murray.

Drexler took Thorpe’s locker at the Summit, left up the reproduction of the Houston Post front page with the two-inch high CHAMP CITY headline from last June and scored at least 22 points in eight of his first 11 games. The transition would have been smooth, except that the Rockets went south soon after, finishing 7-8 in March and 5-7 in April to head into the playoffs as the No. 6 team in the Western Conference.

Injuries or illness to Olajuwon, Horry, Carl Herrera and Maxwell were major factors, but it didn’t help that Herrera became the starting power forward and (gulp) Pete Chilcutt and Chucky Brown were the backups. The defending champions were going down, and everybody pointed a finger at the trade.

Everybody, that is, except Rocket management.

“If you looked at all the crazy things that happened to us, with Maxwell going down, with Horry being out, with Dream being out, I could see where we would have had a very hard time scoring points,” Coach Rudy Tomjanovich said.

“We won a couple road games where Clyde exploded. You could say it’s against the Clippers, but, you know, they could beat you there. There could have been a chance that we didn’t even make the playoffs if we didn’t have a guy who could score like that.”

Drexler averaged 21.4 points in 35 games with Houston and shot 50.6%, up from his 42.8% with the Trail Blazers. In the playoffs, he has averaged 20.5 points on 49.6% shooting, along with 6.2 rebounds and 4.5 assists, and the Rockets have clawed their way through two series and have a 3-2 edge in the Western Conference finals entering tonight’s game here against San Antonio.

Jack Ramsay, who coached Drexler his first three years in the NBA, says the eight-time all-star has never played better. It’s like 1992 again, when Drexler finished second to Michael Jordan in the MVP voting. He’s 32 going on 29.

“It was like newfound youth for Clyde once he got here,” Murray said. “He’s playing in front of people he’s been playing in front of his whole life, and that’s just extra adrenaline added to every game. You can see he’s like a 21-year-old running around out there again.”

Said Rocket assistant Carroll Dawson: “I see a spark in his eye, if that’s what you’re talking about. Maybe he is a little quicker. Maybe he doesn’t get as tired as fast. Maybe the adrenaline is pumping a little bit more because he is back home and is with a different team. As he got comfortable with this team, I think he got excited about the game very much.”

Drexler, being Drexler, doesn’t get into self-examination, at least for public consumption. His comments are always as vanilla as his game is thrilling, which made his January demand to be traded from the Trail Blazers all the more shocking.

So ask him about a newfound enthusiasm and he downplays it.

“I just think it’s a new situation, a new opportunity, and I wanted to make the best of it,” he said. “In my opinion, I’ve got the same attitude I’ve always had. I just try to do whatever you can to help the team.”

Ask him about coming home and he speaks with barely a hint of emotion.

“It’s been great,” he said. “It’s been a unique opportunity, to be able to come to a team of this nature and contribute and do the same things I’ve been able to do my whole career. It’s been phenomenal.”

But ask him about the notion of having given up on the dream of winning a championship, in Houston with Olajuwon no less, and there is response with a pulse.

“I don’t think you ever give up on anything,” he said. “At the young age of 32, you don’t even think about it. I haven’t even reached the back nine yet.”

Not the way he has played. Business is still booming.