Soul of the Golden State

Chapter 648
Before the All-Star Weekend, the Warriors still have two away games to play. The first is the San Antonio Spurs, the second of the top three in Texas to face on the 5th.

The Spurs are really not old at this time, especially when the starting veteran Terry Cummings is injured, the average age of the Spurs starting tonight is only 25 years old, which is younger than the average age of the Warriors.

It's a pity that no matter how young the team is, it can't escape the trouble of injuries. The Spurs, which were a blockbuster last season, still maintain a pretty good record so far this season, ranking fourth in the Western Conference and only one game behind the Lakers.

But the wave of injuries has always troubled the Spurs. First, the veteran Cummings' appearance became intermittent, and then the team's starting point guard Rod Scrickland and shooting guard Willie Anderson came off the bench. The appearances of many people are also limited, and the only ones with a high appearance rate are David Robinson and Sean Elliott.

However, it is not all bad news for the Spurs. Due to the large number of personnel rotations, some players who were originally fringe figures finally have the opportunity to show themselves.

The outstanding one among them is "Little General" Avery Johnson.

As an undrafted player in 88, Johnson's experience was as bumpy as his draft pick.

With a height of only 178cm, it is difficult for him to be favored by an NBA team. In the end, he can only inhabit the small leagues. Fortunately, the Sonics gave him the opportunity to really enter the gate of the NBA.

In fact, Frank also considered Avery Johnson at the time, but the main reason was that the point guard positions of the Warriors were already overcrowded at the time. When the team became vacant, Johnson already had a next home, so he had no choice but to miss it.

After switching to the Spurs this season, taking advantage of the Spurs' injuries, he quickly occupied a place in the rotation lineup, and even became the starter tonight, and will directly face Li Weisi.

For Johnson, this will be a huge challenge, because on defense, it is difficult for other Spurs to provide effective help to Johnson, and Johnson needs to fight alone on the court.

After the start of the game, as people thought, the Warriors really seized Johnson's point, and Li Weisi was the first to attack.

I have to say that Johnson really worked hard and was very tenacious when facing Li Weisi. He almost wanted to do every detail well, but unfortunately, the gap in ability sometimes cannot be saved by attitude.

No matter how hard Johnson tried, it was a pity that he was still lacking in defending Li Weisi.

Due to the large height difference and the terrifying shooting ability of Li Weisi, Johnson was too sensitive to Li Weisi's shooting action. With Robinson's supplementary defense, he completed the throw.

After the start, this is already Li Weisi's 7th point. In three rounds, none of the rounds failed to score, which shows how effective Johnson's defense is against Li Weisi.

However, the score was 7:6, and the Warriors led by only 1 point.

The reason is that the Spurs' offense after the start was also very good.

In the first three rounds, the Spurs made shots from Robinson, Willie Anderson and Elliott respectively. It seems that the whole team feels very good.

Sure enough, it was the Spurs' turn to attack again. Johnson, who had been quite embarrassed on the defensive end just now, seemed to be reborn at this time, and came to the frontcourt with the ball confidently.

Even though he was facing the two consecutive MVP winners and the number one star in the league, Johnson was not afraid at all and made bold moves in front of Li Weisi.

However, Johnson's dribbling is very stable, and it is almost impossible for Li Wei to stop the ball from Johnson's hands.

Using speed, Johnson successfully broke through Li Weisi's defense. This time, facing the fleeting opportunity, Johnson decisively chose a jumper with an emergency stop.

The previous few passes made the Warriors' defensive players hesitate this time, causing Johnson to successfully complete the shot, and the basketball went into the net hollow, without even touching the edge of the basket.

In this way, the Spurs once again succeeded in overtaking the score.

If it was just Johnson alone, the Warriors would not be too nervous. However, the efficiency of the Spurs team is extremely high tonight, which leads to the situation of tonight's game, which is not optimistic for the Warriors.

As the Spurs suffered injuries, resulting in a shortage of bench personnel, so head coach Larry Brown had to shorten the rotation, extend the playing time of the starting lineup, and carry out the eight-man rotation to the end.

Therefore, at the end of the first quarter, the Spurs temporarily led the Warriors by 31 point at 30:1.

The anxious situation in the entire first quarter was the epitome of the whole game. Until the fourth quarter, the point difference between the two teams never exceeded 5 points.

Once a certain team finds that it is lagging far behind, it will immediately make adjustments to slow down the success rate and prevent the score difference from being too large to catch up.

In addition, although Avery Johnson has a gap with Li Weisi in terms of scoring ability and organizational ability, Johnson still has his own unique insights into the rhythm control, and through his control of the rhythm, it is the most commonly used by the Warriors. A wave of flow, did not appear tonight.

However, as the game got longer and longer, the situation inevitably tilted towards the Warriors.

Although Larry Brown uses an eight-man rotation, even so, he does not dare to use too many substitute players. Among the three substitutes, except for Paul Plessy, the other two, Clifford Wright And Sean Higgins played less than 15 minutes.

As a result, the Spurs' starters will inevitably need to take on more playing time, especially for the three starters Robinson, Anderson and Elliott, it is almost certain that their playing time will exceed 40 minutes.

On the other hand, for the Warriors, their formation is still easy and unhurried.

This led to the lack of obvious contrast at the beginning of the game, but in the fourth quarter, the gap gradually became apparent, and the Spurs' shooting percentage declined.

The shooting rate exceeded 60% in the first three quarters, but after the fourth quarter, it began to decline and was approaching the 50% red line.

Before that, Johnson, who was confidently stopping the jumper in front of Li Weisi, was even directly blocked by Li Weisi in an offense.

In this way, the Warriors finally started to exert their strength in the fourth quarter, accumulating more and more. By the end of the game, the team defeated the Spurs 112:106.

Although the point difference is not big, but in the last 2 minutes of the game, it was obvious that the Spurs felt helpless in chasing points, and they were able to support themselves on the court with one breath.

But at the last moment of the battle, they lost their fighting spirit long ago, and the Warriors have always firmly grasped the situation, maintaining the lead until the end.

(End of this chapter)