Almighty legend life

Chapter 217
The Lakers won the first two home games of the second round of the playoffs with ease. The Lakers had already established a huge advantage when they basically entered the fourth quarter. The reason for this was the Supersonics coach George Carl's tactics were restrained by Lakers coach George Krent's tactics, and on the other hand, it was because of the existence of Liu Han. For the current Supersonics team, Liu Han itself is an unsolvable existence, unless in The Lakers made their own mistakes during the game, otherwise it would be difficult for the Sonics to establish an advantage.And Liu Han is precisely the kind of player who is as stable as a rock. There are currently only two players in the league with this temperament, one is Liu Han, and the other is the Spurs super rookie Tim Duncan.

However, the two big victories are happy for the fans of the Lakers. They feel that their home team will sweep the Sonics and advance to the Western Conference Finals again like last year's playoffs.

The performance of the Lakers also made many media and basketball commentators believe that they will easily beat the Sonics.

For the league, the rise of the Lakers last season is worthy of recognition, but the impact of the current Lakers on the future development of the league may be negative.As the Bulls were overthrown by the Lakers when they established their dynasty for the second time, and a group of Bulls players have been declining with age, then the Bulls will not become the team that dominates the league again. The development of the team is good, and the strength shown by the Lakers now makes the league's top management worry that they will dominate for a long time. This is a huge harm to the overall competitiveness of the league, so the Lakers must be suppressed in the next season. .

Just as David Stern was considering how to curb the performance of the Lakers in the coming season, the pace of the playoffs was still moving forward.

The Charlotte Hornets on the road beat the Bulls in a surprise 78-76 playoff game in the Eastern Conference on the same day as the Lakers and Sonics in Game [-] of their second-round playoff series .

The Hornets played badly in the first three quarters. They even scored 13 points in the first quarter, and only scored 49 points in the first three quarters. Under the tight defense of the Bulls, they were like bees who couldn't find the north. Rampage.Although the Bulls' offense was not very strong today, their defense was really good. When they entered the fourth quarter, they still led by 8 points.

But what no one expected was that the Hornets seemed to have changed into a different team after entering the fourth quarter. Glen Rice only scored 2 points in the first three quarters, but entering the fourth quarter, he directly turned into a super shooter. Pippen, who defended him, was confused.

The Hornets staged a big reversal in the fourth quarter. They scored 29 points in the fourth quarter, while the Bulls only scored 19 points. In the end, with Glenn Rice's mid-range shot at the last moment, the Hornets scored 78 to 76 An away victory over the Bulls tied the total score at 1-1.

On May 5, the Knicks played an away game against the Pacers. Facing the fierce defensive Pacers, although the Knicks played very hard, they ended in failure in the end.They lost Game 7 on the road 77-85.

In the second matchup between the Spurs and the Jazz, the two teams staged an offensive battle. The Spurs scored 20 points. Rookie Tim Duncan scored a game-high 26 points and 9 rebounds.David Robinson also scored 21 points and 14 rebounds, but the Jazz team was helpless. Six players scored in double figures. Karl Malone and Jeff Hornacek both scored 15 points. In the end, relying on Stoke The Jazz beat the Spurs 109-106 with a key three-pointer by Donton [-] seconds before the end of the game.

On May 5, the Bulls came to an away game to challenge the Hornets. After an unexpected loss in the last game, the Bulls strengthened their offense in this game. They played 8 players in this game, and 12 scored points. The Hornets, who scored more points, couldn't find a way to defend.

Although Glen Rice scored 31 points for the Hornets, apart from him, only Anthony Mason Jr. and Divac scored 2 points.In the end, the Hornets lost to the Bulls at home, and the total score came to 1 to [-], with the Bulls leading.

The Lakers, who had a day off, also started their road trip. They came to Portland to challenge the Trail Blazers away.

The referee for this game was Steve Javi, who was hired in 1986. This 43-year-old referee is a new batch of well-known referees who have grown up in the NBA, and his original partner was "bald" Crawford.

Before the start of this game, Javi had received hints from the league. After being a referee for more than a dozen seasons, Javi knew exactly what he should do in this game.

After the Sonics experienced the disastrous defeat of the first two games, head coach George Karl made a "big move" in this game. Since the Lakers' offense is so strong, they will do everything possible to interrupt the Lakers' offensive rhythm and let the Lakers The Lakers have no way to play a smooth offensive cooperation, so that the Sonics have a chance to fight the Lakers.

What makes the Sonics happy is that they felt that the referee's scale was relatively loose today at the beginning of the game, and many actions that would definitely be fouled in the past were let go in this game.

The Lakers did not change the starting lineup again in this game. George Krent feels that the current Lakers can be considered to have grown up completely, and the players can cope with the situation on the court.

But what the Lakers didn't expect was that they felt very difficult from the beginning of the game.

When jumping the ball in the middle circle, O'Neal still won the victory, but the ball he dialed out was obtained by the Sonics. When Gary Payton grabbed the ball with Nash, he grabbed Nash's clothes with a concealed movement, so that the opponent could not However, the Lakers retreated fairly quickly, and the Sonics did not have the awareness of launching a fast break, so the game formed a positional battle from the beginning.

Payton dribbled the ball across the half court. Center Jim McElvaine mentioned that Payton was covering from the outside. Originally, Nash bypassed Jim's screen, but the opponent moved to block Nash again. If this action was normal, it would definitely It will be called a mobile screen foul, but today the referee did not blow the whistle.

Payton broke into the three-point line with a screen, and then made a pull-up jumper to score two points.Nash also signaled to the referee because of the opponent's actions, but the referee Javi did not show the slightest sign.

The Lakers attacked, and Nash dribbled the ball to the inside O'Neal after half court. This tactic is now a regular tactic for the Lakers. O'Neal has a huge advantage in the interior. It is a crime to play such a powerful center.

However, as soon as O'Neal received the ball and was about to dribble, he turned around and made a strong move, but Payton's flanking attack came very quickly, and he cut the ball directly.Payton's steal directly hit O'Neal's hands, and after the ball landed, it was caught by Sonics center Jim. O'Neal angrily signaled to the referee that the opponent's thug had fouled, but Javi still didn't say anything.

At this time, the Sonics took advantage of the Lakers' bewilderment to launch a fast break. Their German small forward Schramff made an emergency stop jumper during the fast break and made a mid-range shot.The Sonics had a surprising four-point lead over the Lakers in the opening game.

The players of the Lakers team felt a little bit of anger, because the referee was really a little bit wrong today. They were taken care of in the past, but now not only is there no care, but they are also very targeted. This makes the young people of the Lakers team feel a little angry .

However, what the Lakers didn't expect was that this was just the beginning of their difficult game.

(End of this chapter)