The Golden Age of Basketball

"...er, sunny~~~gump!"

On the evening of November 11th, at the Portland Memorial Stadium, all the lights of the home court were turned off. Amid the high-pitched and deliberately drawn-out voice of the DJ, Gan Guoyang boarded the court surrounded by his teammates.

In the past more than 150 nights, Gan Guoyang has become the king of Portland from the first rookie to stand on the field and applaud his teammates behind him.

This year's NBA appearance ceremony, every team began to change, Portland's change is the most obvious, that is, when the home team is on the field, the lights are turned off, and then the big stage lights directly hit the players. This suggestion was proposed by Gan Guoyang Yes, it has been well received by the Trail Blazers.

Now, Gan Guoyang is enjoying the glory of standing under the spotlight. Tonight, he will lead the Portland Trail Blazers to usher in the first game of the 1988-1989 season, against the Phoenix Suns.

But this game is different from the first preseason game. This will be a real battle, a battle between the Trail Blazers and the Suns.

Many ball commentators have also pointed out that this year's Western Conference will be a year of change. The Los Angeles Lakers fell to the Finals for two consecutive years. After one season, he will retire from basketball.

Gan Guoyang knew that because of his arrival, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar lost two rings, but his career was also great enough, but it was time to step on their corpses and step on the throne.

Other heroes in the West are also ready to move. The Phoenix Suns, which have been strengthened in the summer, are naturally one of them. With Kevin Johnson, Jeff Hornacek and Tom Chambers, the Suns will be in the next few years. A strong contender for the Blazers in the West.

It's just that the future belongs to the future. Although the Suns are strong on paper, they are undoubtedly dwarfed by the even stronger pioneers.

When the lights on the scene were turned back on, the audience finally began to appreciate the new season's games, and they couldn't wait.

In the starting lineup, Adelman still used a relatively safe five-man group of Gan Guoyang, Williams, Cauchy, Drexler, and Porter.

After this combination joined Buck Williams, the athletic ability of the whole team can be said to have reached a peak in the league. In the Utah Jazz game, the Blazers did not have an absolute advantage in the interior. Gan Guoyang faced Karl Malone and Mark Eaton alone, and the Blazers' three arrows in the backcourt poked holes in the Jazz's backcourt.

Now, with the arrival of "Bucks" Williams, he is already biased towards small forwards in height, so that the Blazers' athletic ability has been further strengthened.

In comparison, the iron triangle of the Suns, Kevin Johnson is too young, Hornacek is too thin, Tom Chambers is too slow, the insider Mark West can only pray that he will not be blown up by Gan Guoyang .

At the beginning, the Blazers' offense was like a tide rushing towards the sun. After two years of training, Terry Porter and Cauchy became more and more decisive on the offensive end, and they handled the ball more boldly and fiercely. .

In the opening game, Adelman asked Porter and Cauchy to let go of the attack, creating strong pressure on the Suns' backcourt, so that the opponent had no chance to breathe.

Ever since, Porter scored the Blazers' first point of the new season with a three-pointer at the top of the arc.

Porter relied on Gan Guoyang's cover. After rushing from the middle, the chance was not good, and he passed it back to Gan Guoyang. Gan Guoyang faced the basket and held the ball from the left hand side, but he did not choose to force a layup, but passed the ball back.

At this time, Porter had already returned to the front three-point line. Kevin Johnson was only concerned about defending Gan Guoyang, and missed Porter. Porter caught the ball and made a three-pointer.

As soon as the game started, the atmosphere became hot.

The Suns are obviously not used to the new season. After all, there is not enough running-in between the Iron Triangle, and it is an away game. Kevin Johnson is obviously inexperienced in controlling the team's offense. Gan Guoyang's sudden double-teaming made him panic. He was stunned, but a cross pass went out, and the ball was cut off by Drexler.

How could Drexler miss such an opportunity, the glider is about to take off again!

But this time, Drexler not only glided, but also made a swinging arm in the air, a big windmill dunk!

In the first minute of the game, the morale of the Blazers reached the first peak. At this time, the Memorial Stadium was as noisy as the finals.

After the team has been further strengthened this year, the enthusiasm of Blazers fans for basketball and the desire for championships have also reached their peak. This season, the season tickets of the Blazers have been sold out early, and the rent of the advertising space in the Memorial Stadium has also doubled. .

The momentum of the Blazers has not been interrupted. They have always maintained strong vitality in the first quarter. The tacit supplementary defense and tireless rotation in the defense made the Suns helpless on the offensive end.

The only Suns performance is relatively normal, and only Jeff Hornacek can score points under the defense of the Blazers to stabilize the situation.

Hornacek entered the NBA in 1986. This guy who looks like a little white man doesn't look like a basketball player in any way. He is slow and thin. Some people predict that he won't last two seasons in the NBA.

As a result, after spending his rookie season, he made great progress in the 87-88 season, especially in assists. As a shooting guard, he averaged 6.6 assists per game, and his shooting percentage also reached an astonishing 50.00%.

In this game, the young Kevin Johnson, as the Suns' point guard, was distracted by the Blazers' backcourt and Gan Guoyang's oppression.

The Suns coach decisively paused and replaced Hornacek. Hornacek took over the baton. Kevin Johnson handed over the ball after halftime and began to be an attacker. Hornacek organized the offense.

Although Hornacek is an inconspicuous white man, his basic skills are extremely solid. He dribbles, passes, and directs his teammates to move. The shooting percentage is also a headache for Drexler.

However, a single Hornacek has no way to compete with the entire Blazers. The powerful new aid they introduced this year, Tom Chambers, encountered a tough defense from Buck Williams inside.

The stake is just a Buck Williams. Fortunately, Gan Guoyang's supplementary defense was very timely. Tom Chambers basically gave up on his own attack after eating two big hats.

At the end of the first quarter, the Blazers scored 37 points, while the Suns only scored 19 points. They fell behind the Blazers by 18 points in the first quarter.

"Don't stand still in one place when defending. Of course, the most important thing is to give the referee a sense of 'I am moving', such as turning around, reaching out, and not letting the referee focus on you. You will be called for a defensive violation. Also, in the regular season, our rhythm will be very fast, we will not wait for anyone, you have to keep up with our rhythm." At the beginning of the second quarter, Gan Guoyang sat on the bench to guide Follow Sabonis and tell him some issues that should be paid attention to in the regular season.

Sabonis's performance in the preseason should be said to be good, especially as a transfer station for the ball in the offense, and the task has been completed very well.

His main problems are two points. His defensive performance is easy to be called illegal defense, because he is used to defending zone defense in Europe, and he can't change it for a while; the second is that his speed is still slow in offense. For such a beastly trailblazer, Sabonis still needs to practice his switchback.

Like an obedient elementary school student, Sabonis lowered his head and listened carefully to Gan Guoyang's instructions. Many of Gan Guoyang's opinions were his valuable experience accumulated in the NBA. You must know that although Gan Guoyang has only been in the league for four years, among them He was reimbursed for one year, but in the three years he was there, the Blazers could at least reach the Western Conference Finals, and the experience accumulated in the playoffs was doubled.

"Okay Gan, get ready to play and finish them off." At this time Adelman reminded Gan Guoyang and told him to get ready to play again.

Gan Guoyang immediately took off his jacket and looked up at the score of the two sides. It was 48:32. After Gan Guoyang left the field, the Suns relied on the inside to pull back some points, and Tom Chambers' touch slowly recovered.

Gan Guoyang scored four points in the first quarter only by relying on open jumpers and picking up misses at the basket. Now Adelman's meaning is very clear, let Gan Guoyang beat the sun with a fist in the second quarter.

Obviously, the current Gan Guoyang has this ability.

The Suns players felt the pressure again immediately after Gan Guoyang re-entered the court, especially the Suns center forward, because Gan Guoyang started to attack.

After four years of training, Gan Guoyang's offensive skills have reached the pinnacle. Unlike in the past, when he had to use all his strength to get in position at the basket and then receive a lob from a defender to attack, Gan Guoyang can receive the pass from anyone anywhere and then launch an attack. attack.

The reason why he was able to achieve such an effect is that Gan Guoyang controlled his weight at 245 pounds in the summer. Last season, he increased his weight to 260 pounds. Although he was almost invincible in the low position, the tactical restrictions were too great.

In this regard, the Suns did not do enough for Gan Guoyang's positioning and restricting the ball. Gan Guoyang can always run to the open position, and then Drexler can tear the Sun's defense with a pass, and Gan Guoyang can use the ball. His [-] skills put the ball in the basket at the end.

After Gan Guoyang easily scored four goals in a row, the Suns had to call a timeout. This kind of scoring made the Suns' coach feel cold sweat running down his back.

On the other hand, Gan Guoyang looked relaxed, and his scoring looked ordinary, not fancy at all, nor explosive, as if everything was taken for granted.

At this time, he has actually entered a "field" (field). In this "field", all the opponent's defenses are full of loopholes. In his eyes, there is no obstacle between the basket and him. .

This is the realm of superstars, the-field, and there are only a handful of people in the league who can step into it. Now, Gan Guoyang has finally stepped into it.