Slam Dunk: My Study Abroad Career in Northern Hunan

Chapter 665 The young second core!
"Dang~"

As O'Neal took his first free throw shot, a crisp sound of iron sounded in the court. The basketball hit the edge of the front basket, went straight, and bounced directly into O'Neal's hands.
Subconsciously catching the rebounding basketball, O'Neal's dark face looked even darker at this moment.

"Don't be impatient, Shaquille."

"Take your time, it's okay, just adjust for a while."

Rick Fox and Robert Horry high-fived O'Neal who was standing at the free throw line and gave their own encouragement.

Garnett, who was just standing under the basket preparing to grab a rebound, would not give O'Neal any quiet environment to adjust his mentality. His favorite thing was to mess with the opponent's mentality.

"Hey, Shaquille, don't force yourself to do something you're not good at."

"Your free throw shooting is really bad!"

"If I were you, I wouldn't shoot like that."

"Learn from Rick Barry. When I was young, I didn't have enough strength, so I just shot like that. It was pretty good~"

The Rick Barry Garnett talks about is a senior NBA player who developed the legendary "toilet pouring" shooting method.

Not to mention, although his shooting posture is weird and ugly, his free throw shooting percentage is really awesome.

I have a career free throw shooting percentage of 90%. I wonder if you are afraid of it.

Garnett's words seemed to be a serious suggestion to O'Neal, but he couldn't hold back his smile at all. He grinned widely, bared his teeth, and looked extremely happy.

Wallace, who was on the other side of the paint area, heard Garnett's words and smiled "kindly" towards O'Neal on the free throw line.

Feeling the deep malice of his opponent, O'Neal's face was ugly. After receiving the free throw from the referee again, O'Neal dribbled a little longer this time, then raised the ball over his head, aimed for a while, and shot again.

"Dang~"

This time, O'Neal used too much force, and the basketball hit the edge of the inner basket and flew out again.

"Snapped!"

Garnett reacted quickly, went directly to the basket, picked off the rebound with one hand, and then happily said to O'Neal: "Look at you, your shot is so stiff, is it a sequelae of mechanical dancing?"

O'Neal does a lot of work in private, and Garnett has heard some rumors about O'Neal.

He likes to dance mechanically. This was what O'Neal said himself when chatting with his Western Conference teammates during the All-Star Game. Now Garnett uses it to ridicule O'Neal.

"Shut up, you bastard."

"I'll show you how powerful I am!"

"Don't worry, it's your turn!"

O'Neal is not the kind of person who doesn't respond to sarcasm, but his words are too soft for Garnett.

Garnett grinned and glanced at O'Neal contemptuously without saying a word. It was just his demeanor that made O'Neal even more angry.

During the transition between offense and defense, the basketball was passed to Marbury, who took the ball and began to advance toward the frontcourt. From the Lakers' previous defense, Marbury more or less figured out the Lakers' defensive intentions.

The opponent kept adding defensive strength to Wu Dao, which was a good opportunity for the other members of the Timberwolves.

The defensive power that a scorer like Wu Dao can involve is quite terrifying.

And Marbury is not the traditional No. 1 position. He is the No. position with excellent singles ability. Facing an opponent of Fisher's level, Marbury has no reason not to try it himself!
Marbury, who was at the top of the arc, did not turn his attention to martial arts this time. He placed his center of gravity very low while holding the ball, and observed Fisher's position far more times than he did when observing the movements of other players on the field. .

Although it was only a small movement, Wu Dao quickly understood Marbury's thoughts, quickly left the wing position, and sank towards the bottom corner on the right.

Wu Dao's running movement also made Garnett react, quickly pulled forward from the inside, and provided Marbury with a right screen.

After a simple screen, Garnett moved down the inside, and his downward movement also attracted Robert Horry's pursuit.

Marbury is so fast that he immediately accelerates forward after Garnett's pick-and-roll is in place. While Garnett accelerates downward, he also quickly dribbles the ball forward from the right.

At the same time as Marbury broke through, Wu Dao in the bottom corner quickly pulled back and lifted up, giving Marbury one more option to play the ball.

It's just that the movement of martial arts seems a bit redundant. After all, a lone wolf is a wolf, and people also eat meat.

Marbury, who quickly got to the basket, faced a not too strong defensive force. With a layup, he directly sent the ball into the basket.

"Not bad! A good fight!"

"Hurry back to defense, and pay attention to shrinking the defense line when defending!"

On the sidelines of the court, Coach Philip clapped and looked very happy. During this period, the Timberwolves have changed again. The players have found their own position on the court around martial arts. The running-in between the players is getting better and better, and the power of this lineup is slowly coming into play.

Compared to the Timberwolves game at the beginning of the season, the Timberwolves today are more like a team, and the tacit understanding between the players is pretty good.

The Timberwolves themselves have an offensive strength such as martial arts. Now Marbury and Garnett have perfectly integrated into the team's offensive system, taking the team's offensive capabilities to a new level.

In Philip's eyes, there is no team whose defense his players cannot break!
On the court, the Lakers fought back again.

Fisher repeated his old trick, knowing that he could not directly lob the ball to the inside, so he could only do the next best thing and pass it to Eddie Jones on the wing.

Only this time, Eddie Jones did not pass the ball to O'Neal. After a feint, Eddie Jones dropped the ball and rushed in. The very fast first step caught the casual Tom off guard, and was directly knocked out by the opponent from his own goal. Sliding past.

Eddie Jones traveled to the mid-range. Because he was afraid of Garnett's defensive interference, Eddie Jones directly combined the ball in the high post and shot.

The basketball flew out of Eddie Jones' hands and fell steadily into the net with a crisp sound.

"Sorry, mine."

Tom, who failed in defense, had a good attitude and apologized to Wu Dao and other teammates with some remorse.

Faced with his humble attitude, the Timberwolves players behaved very harmoniously. During the attack, Wu Dao ran to Tom's side, patted Tom's back gently, and whispered:

"Eddie Jones of the Lakers has a very fast first step."

"When he catches the ball on the left wing, he usually drops the ball with his right hand and rushes forward. You mainly need to guard against his strong side hand."

"You can give some leeway to the weak-side hand's breakthrough." "If he slips through the baseline and forces a breakthrough, just use your body to force him to the baseline."

"You have a better physique than him, so don't compete with him for speed. It's pointless."

A fan of the authorities, Tom, who is directly facing off against Eddie Jones, is still troubled by the fact that the Lakers' All-Star No. 2 has comprehensive skills and outstanding abilities, and he has not noticed the opponent's little habit of breaking through at all.

In fact, according to Tom's basketball IQ, he can also find such a problem, but playing by himself is different from watching the ball on the sidelines. When defending, he needs to focus, and he must be wary of both Eddie Jones and O'Neal.

The vision and mentality of the players on the field are completely different from those of the audience.

In the next few rounds of offense and defense, the Timberwolves played very smoothly. The Lakers put most of their defensive focus on Wu Dao, which also led to other Timberwolves players having more one-on-one or one-on-one opportunities.

Although the Lakers want to shrink the defense and prevent Marbury from getting to the basket so easily, Garnett's shooting ability is also very good on the Timberwolves. The tactical policy of shrinking the defense is correct, but like this The defense simply couldn't guard the Timberwolves.

Their team lacks that kind of perimeter defensive elite.

Rick Fox's physical condition is excellent enough, but it is impossible for him to let go of martial arts and instead help Fisher limit Marbury's advance.

And what's even worse is that Tom's side is also a great threat. He has successfully scored in the limited opportunities with the ball.

On the defensive end, the Lakers have been blown away by the Timberwolves.

The inability to guard against the Timberwolves' offensive actually didn't surprise the fans. After all, in the current league, almost everyone knows how terrifying the Timberwolves' offensive capabilities are.

But
If it's just that you can't guard your opponent, it's not that it's unacceptable.

What made Lakers coach Del Harris break the defense was that not only was the Lakers' defense penetrated by the Timberwolves, but the team's offense was also defended by the Timberwolves.

The Timberwolves' defensive strategy against O'Neal is very simple, moving forward without the ball and a lot of double-teaming.

Of course, with O'Neal's ability, even if the Timberwolves adopt this method, he can still occasionally receive the ball from his teammates and attack.

At this time, the Timberwolves came up with another tactical strategy for O'Neal.
foul!

Big Ben committed two fouls in the first half of the first quarter, and then was taken off the court by Philip and replaced by Roberts, who was a human shield. Roberts was even more merciless when facing O'Neal, an old classmate. The foul was ridiculously big.

O'Neal was often sent to the free throw line, and the entire first quarter was fragmented by various stoppages.

And O'Neal became more and more irritable as he played in this game. He was not good at free throws in the first place, but today he was even worse at free throws.

A human shield resisted O'Neal's strong attack. Garnett used his mobility to help defend, go around, etc. The Timberwolves' tactics against O'Neal were very effective.

After the entire first quarter, O'Neal only scored 3 points.
But the price was Wallace's two fouls and Roberts' two fouls.

However, compared to the benefits, the cost paid by the Timberwolves is acceptable.

O'Neal was locked up by the Timberwolves with such a "little" trick, and the performance of other Lakers was not very optimistic.

Eddie Jones's personal ability is excellent, but in today's game he rarely hit the inside. The few times he hit the ball were interfered by Garnett or the previous boss.

Eddie Jones, who felt the strong defense of the Timberwolves inside, changed his offensive line and used more shots from the mid-to-high low-efficiency zone to score.

But his touch today was really not that good. He hit the ball frequently and the Timberwolves missed a lot of rebounds.

As for the Lakers' Fisher, his independent offensive ability as a rookie is actually very weak in the eyes of the Timberwolves and Lakers players.

If you go inside, you will encounter Garnett's sweeping help defense.

But on the outside, Fisher's shooting percentage is not necessarily better than Eddie Jones. The offense of these two people can hardly support the Lakers' outside scoring.

As for Rick Fox who was defended by Martial Arts?

His performance today was also a bit inconsistent. He scored very few goals and made many mistakes under the pressure of martial arts.

In just one quarter, the Lakers were beaten 31:20 by the Timberwolves, opening up an 11-point deficit in a single quarter.

In the second quarter of the game, Budao and Garnett took turns to rest, and Wallace and Chris Kyle replaced their positions.

For the Lakers, the new All-Star Kobe Bryant also came on as a substitute for Rick Fox, and Robert Horry also got a chance to breathe and was replaced by Campbell.

When the Lakers coach was making personnel adjustments, he did not give power center O'Neal some rest time. He planned to quickly smooth the point difference between the two teams while Garnett, a highly mobile power forward, was not on the court.

The development of the second quarter of the game between the two teams, just as coach Del Harris expected, developed in a direction beneficial to the Lakers.

Kobe, the second youngest All-Star in history, was already beginning to look like a superstar. He had an advantage against Marbury and frequently hit difficult goals under Marbury's defense.

O'Neal did not play smoothly in the second quarter. As his physical exertion increased, the defensive pressure he faced did not weaken much.

Roberts is also a power player. In addition, he only played five or six minutes in the first quarter, only half a quarter. His physical fitness is relatively good, and he is still powerful in the confrontation with O'Neal.

Although Garnett is out of the game for the Timberwolves, Wallace's defensive ability has also improved a lot. His defensive talent is already strong, and he has a good physique. If he focuses on assisting defense and bypassing the front, he can do a lot. very good.

If you can stand on the NBA court and focus on a certain thing, most people can do it well.

However, basketball is a comprehensive sport, and most teams do not require players to do just one thing.

It's just that the Timberwolves are special. Blue-collar players like Wallace can exert full-level value in the Timberwolves.

In the second quarter, the Timberwolves were strong on defense and weak on offense. They fought the Lakers for 19:23 and were chased by their opponents by 4 points.

Coach Philip is quite satisfied with this situation. The team's defense is very strong, which is very helpful to the Timberwolves in containing the Lakers' offense.

But the price also comes with the results.

Roberts received his fifth foul, and Wallace also received his fourth foul. The foul crisis of inside players needs the attention of the coach.

However, Philip just glanced at Garnett and Cherokee Parks in the rest area and didn't take it to heart at all.

The team gathered 4 inside players, a foul? piece of cake!

Compared with the foul problem, the Lakers' young All-Star Kobe Bryant's 10 points, 3 rebounds and 2 assists in a single quarter are more worthy of Coach Philip's attention.