Slam Dunk: My Study Abroad Career in Northern Hunan

Chapter 706 Series G2!

In the past decade or so, the Jazz have been famous in the league for their fierce defense.

The name "Utah's Two Evils" once left a very deep impression on the hearts of fans and players. It's just that their ferocity seems to be ineffective when facing the Timberwolves.

It is naturally impossible for a player like Malone to feel scared because of the so-called knife-wielding guards around him, so he would not dare to take action. What he cared about was not the revenge the Timberwolves gave him after taking action against Martial Arts.

What he cared about was that after he suffered a black-handed counterattack by the Timberwolves, the Jazz collapsed early without the support of a scorer like him.

In order to win, Malone can play dirty tricks on his opponents without any scruples, but don't forget that the ultimate goal of playing dirty tricks is to win the game. If there is no way to win the game, then what is the meaning of playing dirty tricks?

The Jazz are a little different from the Timberwolves. Once the Jazz lose Malone, they will suddenly fall into an ordinary team and cannot even be called a playoff team.

But the Timberwolves are different. Judging from the current level of the Timberwolves, even without Wu Dao, an ace player who leads the team, the Timberwolves with Garnett, Marbury, and Tom as the main core of the team can still maintain their success. offensive firepower.

Even if Wu Dao is not on the court, the Timberwolves are still a strong team with strong strength.

The strength is not on the same level as Jazz at all.

Malone feels that if he can stay on the court, then the Jazz will still have a chance of survival, but if he is not on the court, the Jazz will not even have a chance of survival.

It was precisely because of his desire for victory that Ma Long tried hard to restrain himself and not blatantly do evil tricks in martial arts.

However, the differences between the systems of the Timberwolves and the Jazz are too big. The Timberwolves, which use shooting as their main scoring method, have an easy time facing a team like the Jazz. Several of their outside players have no way to compete with them. Compared with people like Wu Dao and Marbury.

The inside line was contained and the outside line could not be beat. This game quickly formed a one-sided situation.

By the end of the third quarter, the point difference between the two teams had exceeded 20 points, and the game entered garbage time.

The state of the Jazz players is really average. Under the defensive pressure of the Timberwolves, they can't produce any high-quality offense at all.

The point difference exceeded 20, and coach Philip began to choose to arrange rotation and rest for the players on the court. Budo, who scored 33 points in a single game, was also taken off the court to rest, and did not play again in the final quarter of the game.

Compared with the ample rest time in martial arts, Garnett and Marbury play harder. In order to allow these players to have more exercise, Coach Philip also increased the playing time of the players. , let these young players release their "excess" energy and feel the difficulty of the final game.

Of course, Coach Philip still held the line. Garnett, who came on the court only halfway through the first quarter, played 33 minutes, and his playing time was reasonably controlled.

On Marbury's side, the playing time was slightly over-controlled, reaching a terrifying 40 minutes, and there was not much rest time at all.

As the buzzer sounded at the end of the game, the score of the two teams was fixed at 98:82, winning G16 of the second round series with a huge advantage of 1 points.

As the buzzer sounded at the end of the game, the basketball was thrown into the air by Chris Kyle who was holding the ball. The winning Timberwolves players cheered and hugged each other. In the arena, the fans were also excited for this display. The Timberwolves responded with the warmest applause for their strong strength.

The strong performance of the Timberwolves allowed Minnesota fans to see the team's hope of winning the championship. The strength shown by the Timberwolves' players now can bring such a feeling to the fans.

Martial arts showed unparalleled dominance in this game, this dominance can even be compared with Michael Jordan.

In addition to martial arts, Garnett of the Timberwolves also showed outstanding talents. As a power forward, he gave people the feeling of not falling behind in the confrontation with Malone.

Judging from the two players' court data alone, Garnett is even slightly better than Malone.

Although it is said that Malone performed poorly today because the Timberwolves' overall tactics were aimed at him, and it is not that Garnett's personal strength surpassed Malone, in the fans' perception, the most intuitive feeling in this game is that the Timberwolves' addition Nate performed better than Karl Malone.

Not only Wu Dao and Garnett, who are the core players, but even Timberwolves point guard Marbury's performance in this game was better than Stockton, a famous point guard.

The back wave's ruthless crushing of the front wave finally gave Timberwolves fans hope for the team's rise.

After G1, the players of the Timberwolves and Jazz will have a day of rest. The two teams will play the G2 game the day after tomorrow in the Target Center Arena.

Although it is a break, how can any team be able to relax peacefully at this time?

The next morning.

Coach Philip summoned all the players in the team training hall and gave them a video analysis class.

The main purpose of the video class is actually to review the players' omissions in the game against the Jazz, and also to further find loopholes in the Jazz's play style from previous games.

After the entire video session, Wu Dao was the player named most by coach Philip.

Occasionally, he would make some small mistakes in his defensive movements. Although it was said that Garnett or Ben Wallace would make up for them in time during the game, Coach Philip still pointed them out to Wu Dao when watching the video.

"Martial arts, your personal ability is nothing to say."

"But your defense ability still needs more training."

"When I have time, I will ask someone to give you more video lessons."

"You still have a lot of room for improvement. Don't be complacent about what you have achieved so far and become unwilling to make progress."

Coach Philip has great expectations for martial arts. In his opinion, martial arts will be the core cornerstone of the Timberwolves' team building in the next ten years.

If martial arts can be firmly tied to the Timberwolves' chariot, the Timberwolves will remain competitive for the championship in the next few years.

"Yes, I know."

Regarding the problems pointed out by coach Philip, Wu Dao also humbly accepted them.

He is very clear about where his current problem lies. If there are any fatal flaws in his current self, then the awareness of assisting defense is the most critical one.

However, among the Timberwolves, this weakness of his is not very obvious.

Because of the existence of Garnett and Ben Wallace, his defensive loopholes caused by his poor awareness of assisting defense will be immediately eliminated by Garnett and Ben Wallace, two highly mobile inside players. compensated.

The Jazz are a team that does better inside offense than outside offense. Stockton's guys, relying on their old arms and legs, can't make good use of this defensive flaw in Wu Dao.

The video class started early and ended early. At 3 o'clock in the afternoon, Coach Philip announced the disbandment. After the disbandment, the players went back to rest early to recharge their batteries and prepare for the next day's game.

On the evening of May 5th, G7 in the second round of the playoffs.

As the lights in the stadium dimmed, players from the two teams also walked out of the player tunnel and entered the game venue.

As the players entered the stadium, the fans in the stands also cheered.

The Timberwolves, who had a 1:0 lead in the series, were relatively relaxed when facing G2. The players entered the game with a very calm attitude. When facing the Jazz, an old rival, they had a huge psychological advantage.

The psychological advantage will also be directly reflected in the Timberwolves' team momentum.

When the players from the two teams entered the court, the Jazz players could clearly feel the confidence exuded from the bottom of their hearts by the Timberwolves players. This kind of confidence was something the Jazz had never felt from the Timberwolves players on the first day of the game. Arrived.

As the playoffs progress, these young players of the Timberwolves are also quietly undergoing transformation.

In this game, coach Philip changed the previous starting lineup and put on his strongest offensive and defensive system from the beginning.

In addition to the four regular starters of Wu Dao, Garnett, Marbury, and Tom, the team's center also once again used the big black brother Stanley Roberts.

As for the Jazz, they have also made some adjustments to their staffing.

In addition to Malone, Stockton, Jeff Hornacek and center Greg Foster, the starting players also gave up the starting 3 position of Adam Kife and used Brian Russell as the starting player. The team starts at No. 3.

Coach Jerry Longs seems to think that the loss in the first game was because their team's outside shooting ability was not strong enough.

His formation was actually mentally prepared for Malone to be blocked by the Timberwolves again.

"Beep——"

As the buzzer sounded in the court, the basketball was thrown high into the air by the referee. Garnett and Greg Foster jumped high and quickly reached out to point to the basketball.

"clatter!"

With a soft sound in the court, Garnett took the lead in picking up the basketball and swatted the ball toward the backcourt.

After winning the offensive ball, Marbury quickly crossed the center line with the ball, and then quickly passed the ball to Garnett, who had just ran to the wing of the free throw line. The latter took the ball and made a simple explosion and jumped in. After taking one step, he shot a fadeaway jumper.

Malone, who was chasing and defending Garnett, jumped up hard and raised his arms in an attempt to block the shot, but the basketball flew over his head and then fell into the net.

Less than ten seconds into the game, the Timberwolves took the lead and scored two points.

"Oh ho!!"

Garnett, who scored, hammered his chest, let out a strange scream, and looked at Malone, who failed to defend, with a smile on his face.

After defeating the Jazz in G1 of the series, Garnett's confidence, which is better than Malone's in terms of statistics, has been greatly improved.

When he faced this Jazz player again, Garnett not only showed no fear, but was full of confidence and wanted to beat this NBA legend again in this game.

The Timberwolves players began to retreat, and between offense and defense, Jazz's Stockton also quickly entered the frontcourt with the ball.

Although the Jazz have seen the Timberwolves' defense and know that most of the opponent's defensive power will be devoted to Malone.

But the offensive attempt still needed to be made. The basketball in Stockton's hand hit the ground and was quickly sent to Malone, who was in the elbow area with his back to the basket at this time.

As soon as the basketball was in hand, Wu Dao near the three-point line quickly retreated and moved towards Malone. At the same time, Garnett, who was facing Malone, retreated slightly, giving some distance and deliberately selling some loopholes.

Ma Long felt the power behind him weaken, but he also noticed the martial arts that were quickly approaching him. Instead of turning around and attacking the basket, he quickly handed the basketball to Brian Russell outside the three-point line.

This is not the first time Malone has played against Wu Dao and Garnett. He knows very well how mobile and fast these two young men of the Timberwolves are.

At this time, he is still far away from the basket. If he turns around and breaks through in this position, he will inevitably be caught up by Garnett and Wu Dao.

It is not so easy to wait until he gets to the basket and then want to release the ball.

Rather than passively falling into a desperate situation, it is better to pass the ball out early.

The basketball flew past Wu Dao's side. The fast-moving Wu Dao also turned around, quickly turned around, and pounced on Brian Russell.

Facing the aggressive martial arts, Brian Russell's performance in this game was much calmer than in the previous game.

He raised his arm calmly, flipped his wrist, and quickly threw the ball.

It seems that the rest time yesterday was not in vain for these Jazz players.

At the very least, Brian Russell has obviously adjusted his mentality. When facing the martial arts defense, he did not show panic and nervousness like G1.

The arc of Brian Russell's shot was very high, and the basketball flew dangerously from his fingertips and fell towards the basket.

Wu Dao, who failed to block the shot, immediately turned around and ran towards the basket to prepare for the rebound.

But before he had even taken a few steps, he saw the basketball fall steadily into the net with a crisp sound.

In the stands, Jazz fans who saw the goal applauded and cheered. All the Jazz substitutes on the sidelines were also smiling, waving towels in their hands to cheer for their teammates on the court!
"It feels a little different from the last game."

Just an interaction between offense and defense, Wu Dao felt a bad feeling in his heart.

Brian Russell was much more calm today than the day before yesterday. When the opponent shot, his muscles were also very loose, as if he was sure that martial arts would not be able to block his ball.

Moreover, the opponent's shooting point was also adjusted very high. In just one day's work, the opponent seemed to have figured out the limit of his own bounce when chasing back from the inside.

After taking a deep look at the back of Russell who was returning to defense, Wu Dao felt a move in his heart and planned to change his defensive strategy.