The godfather of basketball started from conquering the NBA

Chapter 67: "National Derby" in the playoffs

Reporter: "How do you feel after defeating the Nuggets and meeting your old rival Timberwolves again?"

Bryant: "Nothing, last year they beat us, but this year is different, we have become stronger, and we have been working hard to avenge our shame all summer."

Reporter: "I heard that boss Xu Xiao once strongly opposed Paul's deal. What's your opinion on this?"

Kobe: "He just did what a boss should do. He doesn't want us to become stronger. He is afraid of us. In the next series, I will let them know that the Los Angeles Lakers are strong."

After defeating the Nuggets, Kobe also rarely spoke harshly to the media. It can be seen that he is still very dissatisfied with Xu Xiao's behavior.

But if you are dissatisfied, you will be dissatisfied. What can you do to me? I gave you Garnett for nothing to let you win three championships in four years. It is already the best of humanity. You still want me to give you a Paul for nothing. You are really thinking about it. ah.

The beginning of this round of the series is a nightmare for Los Angeles.

The first game was played at the Timberwolves' home court.

"Guys, we beat the Lakers last year. Many people said that the opponent underestimated the enemy. We are not that scary, so God gave us another chance, let us prove ourselves again, and prove that we will be a nightmare in Los Angeles from now on. !"

"Come on guys, let's win, win the damn series and put LA in the dark."

Accompanied by the bgm of "Wolves Attack", the Timberwolves players worked hard and completed the appearance ceremony.

"It's a good game against the Nuggets, but it's time for you to stop there."

"I don't want to just win 6 championships, I want to surpass Jordan."

Xu Xiao and Kobe, two old friends, naturally wanted to earn some tongue-in-cheek when they met.

Xu Xiao did not use the twin towers again this time. Although the Lakers also have twin towers, they are different from the Grizzlies. The Lakers' twin towers are more of an axis, and the Lakers' scoring points are still concentrated on Kobe.

This year, the inside scoring points have gradually shifted to Bynum. Although Garnett has not suffered any serious injuries, he is old after all and throughout his career, Garnett is not a player who is good at scoring.

His role in the Lakers is more defensive and pivotal.

Garnett is not Nowitzki, Adelaide has a large scoring ratio, or a person with a crushing body like Randolph, so Ibaka is not afraid at all, this is still the peak Ibaka.

The regular starters for the Lakers include Calderon, Kobe, Artest, Garnett and Bynum.

The Timberwolves also used the regular starters: Westbrook, Roy, Josh, Ibaka and Oden.

At the beginning of the game, Oden started a fierce hand-to-hand fight with Bynum in the paint.

Oden's physical fitness is not inferior to Bynum's at all, even more terrifying than Bynum, which makes the "Little Shark" completely deprived of any benefits.

Kobe was still in good shape at the beginning, and Roy succeeded in consecutive singles.

But the Timberwolves' counterattack came very quickly. Westbrook's impact ability is too strong. Westbrook in his peak period also has a fairly accurate mid-range emergency stop "zombie jumper". This kind of shooting is not easy to interfere. , It's not easy to guard against, but Billups' touch is also added.

One person scored 8-0, but he directly overtook the score, which forced the Lakers to pause early.

The Lakers want to defend, but he really doesn't have any decent defensive resources at the point guard. Last year, there was Shannon Brown who could make do with it. This year, Shannon Brown is gone.

If you want to guard against Westbrook, you must let Kobe match up in person.

But now Kobe is 34, and he is no longer that physical monster. If he is to face Westbrook on the defensive end, can he be put aside first, and don't count on the offensive end.

This is tantamount to self-abolition of martial arts, just like the Thunder used Harden to defend against James, which directly caused Harden to be abolished on the offensive end, and the Thunder's own offense has no major problems.

Xu Xiao was also sure of this point, so from the beginning of this round of the series, Xu Xiao set the tone of the game, and Westbrook was the first main attack point.

If the Lakers want to limit Westbrook, there is only one way.

That is to mobilize Artest and Garnett to help defend and block Westbrook's breakthrough route.

Then there is the second key person: Josh.

At this time, Xu Xiao needs Josh to stand up, quickly find the missing position of the Lakers, and give a hard blow.

Sure enough, after returning from the timeout, the Lakers did change their defensive strategy to block Westbrook's route.

Westbrook also understood very well, and quickly found Josh. The latter saw Ibaka in the open position, hit the ground, led Ibaka's position, took off easily under the basket, and dunked successfully.

Compared with Paul, Josh's height and vision are definitely his biggest advantage, and he can make the most of Paul's passing.

Fortunately, the Lakers' shooting percentage was not low in the first half. Although Calderon was not good at defense, he still had a hand on the offensive end.

The stable control of the field and the organization of almost no mistakes made the Lakers' offense run smoothly, and he also hit a three-pointer. This allowed the Lakers not only to not fall behind in the first half, but to lead by 53 points 51-2.

But Xu Xiao was not in a hurry. He knew that the Lakers' current offense still relied on Kobe's unsolvable singles, but in the first half, Xu Xiao obviously didn't give Kobe any strength. He always used Roy and Jimmy Butler to defend.

At the start of the second half, Xu Xiao asked Josh to face Kobe. Josh's tall body, nimble footwork and excellent defensive awareness made Kobe very difficult to deal with.

"Bread" Brown on the sidelines yelled to ask Kobe to call the pick-and-roll, but Kobe actually didn't like the pick-and-roll.

Using a scoring method that I didn't like to attack, the scoring efficiency also plummeted. Later, the Timberwolves simply stopped switching defenses and let Josh go around the screen to defend Kobe.

The Lakers' own offense had problems, and the defense collapsed directly under the chain reaction.

Both Garnett and Artest are rare defensively, but they are both old and not good at speed. The Timberwolves' fast passing of the ball made the Lakers' defense lose sight of one another, and even almost infighting for the Lakers at one point.

"You should go to defend Roy instead of standing here." After Roy hit a three-pointer, Garnett said to Artest dissatisfied.

"You lost your position first, so our defense is so passive. If I wasn't there to guard Ibaka for you, you would have been dunked by him." Also as the former dpoy, Artest also gave There was a strong response.

The two argued for a while, and neither of them backed down.

"Hey man, look what's going on over there."

"I'll wipe it, and my own people will do it."

"I heard that Garnett really has a tradition of punching his teammates hard."

Seeing melons on the opposite side, the Timberwolves' bench also started to eat melons, and there was even jr, who was not a big deal to watch the excitement, and directly encouraged the audience to applaud.

"Calm down both of you, it's my problem, I didn't keep up with them, but we still have a chance now!" At this time, Kobe, the team leader, stood up and spoke up, taking the initiative to block the blame.

But that doesn't change anything.

In the fourth quarter, Kobe once again showed that expression of wanting to eat people, but he is not the 30-year-old him after all.

In the last quarter, Kobe tried to take over the game. He was on the court at the beginning of the fourth quarter and wanted to play the entire fourth quarter, but he was unable to recover.

11投2中6分3篮板3失误1抢断,这时科比最后一节的表现,其中包括最关键的一段时间,科比上演4投0中的灾难级别表现。

Let the Timberwolves easily get off to a good start with 108 to 97 at their home court.

Kobe made 25 of 11 shots in the game. Although he still scored 31 points, he could not beat the Timberwolves with such a performance. Westbrook made 17 of 11 shots and scored 28 points, completely blowing up the Lakers' guard line .

In the second game, "Bread" Brown still had no time to adjust, and the Lakers were bloodbathed by the Timberwolves again. This time it was even worse 118 to 89, and they clocked in three quarters.

Roy scored a team-high 19 points, and the Timberwolves scored in double figures. The only thing to watch in this game was to see the "Chinese Derby" Yao Ming play 7 minutes and scored 20 points and 11 rebounds. Yi Jianlian After playing 8 minutes, he also hit the first goal of his career, and it may be the only goal in a playoff sports game, scoring 7 points.

But this also made the Chinese reporters very happy. Since it is the first time to see the "Chinese Derby" in the playoffs, this traffic is not comparable to ordinary people.

They all went forward to ask Dayao what it was like to meet Ah Lian in the playoffs. On the other hand, there are relatively few people in Ah Lian. After all, Ah Lian is a cold bench in the NBA. machine administrator.

Although Yao Ming is not in his prime, he is still a stable player in the NBA's rotation, and he can start in some weak teams. If it hadn't been for the fact that the United Arab Emirates was in the end, Xu Xiao didn't plan to let Yao Ming waste his time.

"I am very happy to see Ah Lian on the stage of the playoffs. I hope he can continue to move forward. I also want to see him a few more times in the playoffs." Dayao replied with a relatively high emotional intelligence.

The UAE side is a little cold and dull: "We are not players of the same level, but we are still very happy to meet each other on the court. I hope there will be more opportunities for hand-offs in the future."

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