So I am the god of basketball?

Meng Lang made Hardaway suffer a setback right from the start.

Back on the defensive end, Hardaway attempted to use his physical fitness to crush Meng Lang, which was his usual style of play. In his memory, he had relied on this method to complete a breakthrough against Meng Lang in the matchup.

But this time, I don’t know if there is something wrong with his memory.

He was stopped firmly.

Meng Lang's current strength made him feel like he had hit a wall.

In fact, this is also what Hardaway thinks is the most terrifying thing about Meng Lang:

This guy has climbed to this point, but every year, you can feel his improvement.

Whether it's his ability to fight, or...

Unable to shoot, the ball went to Miller under the basket. Miller made a hasty shot but missed, and the defensive rebound under his protection fell into Meng Lang's hands.

Facing Hardaway, he still started with his back to the basket, but this time after getting close to Hardaway, he pretended to turn back to the right, then suddenly turned forward and directly tricked Hardaway away.

Ok……

Don’t rely on your body, just play with your footwork!

Meng Lang has good static talent, even better than Michael Jordan.

Therefore, he can create more space than Jordan, but his dynamic talent is not as good as Jordan's, so the whole movement does not look as smooth, but it is more solid and the movements are more fancy.

"Shh!"

Make another shot!

This suggests that the Warriors must resort to some tricks.

Otherwise, if Meng Lang continues to play like this, they will be in trouble for the game.

After all, they don't have an inside line like the Philadelphia 76ers, who can guarantee rebounds and allow Meng Lang to score without any care.

Preventing Meng Lang from going berserk is a necessary condition for them to win the game.

The Warriors' entire defense began to expand outward.

At this time, Meng Lang passed the ball to Kobe on the wing, asking him to continue to pull the entire defense line with singles.

The Warriors' defense was stretched thin.

Divac calmly directed the ball in the high post, constantly distributing the ball from his hands to the hands of the Lakers players on the court.

good news:
Meng Lang only scored 4 points in the following time.

bad news:
Except for Meng Lang, everyone else's condition was as high as if they had been injected with chicken blood.

The ball kept going into the basket.

At the end of the first quarter, the Warriors were actually in very good shape, and they scored 30 points in the first quarter.

Originally, the "Princeton" system that Adelman coached in the Kings was an offensive team. Now it has encountered the Warriors, a group of more talented players who often scored over 100 points in a single game during the regular season.

In the last round against the Suns, they scored more than 6 points in 4 out of 105 games.

The fierce firepower is evident.

In the first quarter when they have the most energy, they can often score 30 points in a single quarter.

In the past, such a score would have been enough for them to lead into the second quarter.

Even they themselves couldn't tell when was the last time they scored 30 points in the first quarter but still fell behind.

It's just that in tonight's game, they scored 30 points, but the Lakers on the other side were even more powerful than them, scoring a full 36 points...

Adelman was scratching his head.

He really doesn't know how the Warriors can adjust right now.

Defending Meng Lang really took too much defensive effort.

It is no longer enough to adjust more defensive forces to fill the gaps.

and……

In the past, the Warriors relied on offense to defeat their opponents!

They were so successful on the offensive end today, they should have been leading!
Adelman has no way to deal with this situation.

He could only adjust the Warriors' offense and make the Warriors play more aggressively on the offensive end.

In the end, the Warriors scored 110 points in this game.

This season, the Warriors have never lost a game in which they scored more than 110 points.

However, this undefeated record was broken tonight. The Lakers scored 125 points and won with a difference of 15 points.

Chuck Daly made almost no adjustments. After the game, he said something heartbreaking: "I know the Lakers had big problems on defense today, and I also saw the direction of adjustment, but in the end I chose to believe in the Lakers players. I believe that even if it's a competition of offense, the Lakers can win today's game!"

Adelman's expression after the game was completely different from his: "We did a good job, but the Lakers did better tonight!"

哈达威在今晚拿到了24分5篮板7助攻；克里斯-韦伯在今晚拿到了24分10篮板6助攻；“狂人”今晚也拿到了21分，再加上15分的克里斯蒂，还有12分的布拉德-米勒……

Everyone on the Warriors played as usual.

In the Western Conference Finals, it is amazing to be able to perform as well as usual.

And in the past, the Warriors have always won when they performed like this.

Just happened to meet the Lakers.

What's more frightening is that today's Lakers looked...

Meng Lang "only" scored 29 points in the whole game... For other players, this is a score that only superstars can score, but for a man whose scoring ability is getting closer and closer to becoming another "seven consecutive scoring champions" after Jordan, 7 points is really nothing, and can even be described as low.

Tonight, Kobe scored 28 points for the Lakers, Divac scored 18 points, Bryant scored 18 points, and even Ben Wallace scored in double digits, with 11 points. Horry made 5 three-pointers and scored 18 points...

In other words, Meng Lang did not exert any effort tonight, and he won the game entirely relying on the performance of other main players and role players.

This news is somewhat despairing.

Barkley said: "I think many people will have a new evaluation of this Lakers team after the Western Conference Finals. If you don't know how terrible a team that can play 74 wins and 8 losses in the regular season is, you will probably understand it after watching this game!"

He was not wrong. The next day, the media reported similar remarks.

A 15-point difference is indeed not a terrible defeat.

But the Warriors are desperate because they not only cannot see the hope of winning from this game, but also cannot see the hope of winning in the subsequent series from this game. This is the most critical thing.

The Lakers had an easy time in the first two rounds, but now they are facing the Warriors, a team that is supposedly on the same level as them. They still won and made their opponents despair...

Bill Walton said: "If you think you are optimistic about the Lakers, please raise your evaluation of the Lakers by at least 3 levels. That is the dominance that the Lakers should have. I don't know if this is the strongest team in history, but it is definitely one of them!"

In fact, there is absolutely no problem analyzing this Lakers team on paper.

Meng Lang's ability as the "boss" is top-notch in history.

Perhaps only Michael Jordan, Bird and Johnson in their prime could compete with him.

Kobe has also reached his peak, as the team's "second in command", and at the same time at a historical level. Then Divac is a "jack of all trades" in the interior, from defense to organization to offense, he can do almost everything.

He can fill any inside-related tactics of a team.

The addition of Russell gives the outside line a player who can defend the opposing team's core players in addition to Kobe and Meng Lang.

This sentence is scary just reading it.

There are even ball-handling players like Fox and shooting players like Horry on the bench.

The Lakers have almost no weaknesses this season.

And they are all at the peak of their careers...

There were no surprises in the following Western Conference Finals. The Lakers won the second home game, then ran to the Warriors' home court and won the third game of the series, pushing the Warriors to the brink of the cliff with a 3-0 advantage.

The Golden State media shouted slogans, at least they were not eliminated by the Lakers at home.

however……

Before this round of series began, the Warriors were gearing up for a "decisive battle" with the Lakers.

Even if they fail to win in the end, what they want is to win at least 2 games and let the series go to Game 6. If they can drag the series to Game 7, even if they lose, they will feel that it is an honorable defeat.

Such a goal...

But the result?

Capital 0-3!

This is definitely a blow to their mentality.

It is also for this reason that even though they knew they had to defend the fourth game of the series, this could still save some face.

But when they really fight, they really are...

Concubines can't do it!

117 to 80, a difference of nearly 40 points. When the game was about to end, two-thirds of the audience seats were empty.

Warriors fans are still very loyal to the team.

Even if the record is not good, as long as the team plays well, they will come to support it.

But tonight...

They really can't hold it anymore.

The game was so ugly.

Some fans walked out of the stadium and even said in front of the camera: "I need to think carefully about whether I still love basketball!"

The next day, the media reported this:
The Lakers ruined the basketball atmosphere in Golden State.

4-0!

The Lakers swept three games and advanced to the next round.

孟浪在这4场比赛中场均可以拿到34.5分8.5篮板14.5助攻2抢断1.5盖帽。

Shooting percentage 56.4%!

Three-point shooting percentage 48.9%!

100% free throw shooting rate!

Yes, in this series, Meng Lang made all 20 free throws without missing a single one.

Kobe averaged 28.5 points, 5.5 rebounds and 5 assists per game.

It can be said that this was the best series in his career.

Come to think of it, Kobe's original "King of the Western Conference Finals" bloodline also began to awaken in 00, right?
I don't know if I'll be in the finals again this time...

In fact, Meng Lang has an answer to this question.

Originally, Kobe's 00 was his first trip to the finals, so it was normal that he didn't play well.

This time, before the 00 Finals, Kobe had experienced a total of three Finals, and he was not unfamiliar with that stage at all.

So Meng Lang believed that he would definitely perform better this time than before, and much better.

I just don’t know…

The opponent is the Bulls or the Pacers.

The Warriors' final press conference.

The atmosphere was not very good.

Again:
They never thought they would lose so badly in the Western Conference Finals.

After being swept 0-4, their minds were in a mess and they had no idea what to say to the reporters' questions.

Hardaway didn't say a word until the end of the interview.

This should be the series with the biggest gap in his life.

He waited for two years, but what he got was "slaughtered" by his former teammate Meng Lang. This was definitely not the script he had expected at the beginning.

The next day, some media described the Warriors' post-match press conference as a "morgue": "Meng Lang and the Lakers defeated another strong team, just like they defeated the Utah Jazz that year!"

The Western Conference has a result, but the Eastern Conference has just finished three games. The Bulls won their two home games and lost their first home game after joining the Pacers.

Artest was very motivated to defend Michael Jordan.

At the end of Game 2 of the series, Jordan described Artest's defense like this:
"I felt like my ribs were going to be broken by him!"

He was deeply impressed by Artest's defense.

The game between the two teams was already tense enough, but after the Lakers eliminated the Warriors at lightning speed, their game became even more intense.

Not only did the scale of the confrontation become larger than before, but everyone's face was filled with the desire to win.

The score was only 78 to 75 at the end of the game.
The Bulls won by 3 points, changing the score to 3-1.
Reggie Miller had an unwilling look on his face. Facing the media, he expressed the common feelings of both sides: "We are all a bunch of old guys. We want to beat Dream because he has beaten us before. If we can beat him and win the championship, then even if we retire, we won't feel any regrets... That's what I think, and I feel Michael thinks the same way."

He hadn't said another word:
Now it seems that Michael has a better chance of reaching the finals than me. For me, winning this may be my last chance in this life.

Reggie Miller's eyes were filled with reluctance.

Losing to Jordan is not a shameful thing. At most, you feel helpless, but you have to accept this reality.

It's just normal to lose to Jordan.

This was the main theme of the league before 93. Now that he has failed to defeat Jordan and has to face Meng Lang, Reggie Miller feels that this is something he is unwilling to accept.

He is very clear that given his physical condition, after this season, even if he is still in the league, he will definitely no longer be the absolute core of the team.

Starting from this season, the core power of this team has actually begun to shift towards O'Neal Jr. and Artest.

He accepted this result. After all, he was really old. But before the last chance completely disappeared, how could he be willing to just watch it?
Even though he is trailing 1-3 now, as long as there is still one game left, he will not give up so easily! (End of this chapter)