unfinished glory

Chapter 67 Three Attacks on Rockets ([-])

At the beginning of the second half, McGrady focused on organizing and defending after two unsuccessful offenses. Juwan Howard opened up this point. After Yao Ming hit two goals and attracted firepower, he made 5 of 4 shots and scored 8 points in a single quarter.Coupled with the three-pointers of David Wesley and Joan Barry, the Rockets overtook the score in this quarter.

McGrady only scored 2 points in this quarter and only 8 points in the whole game, which made Popovich a little worried.Yao Ming's performance so far is extremely high, with 18 points in the first quarter, 10 points in the second quarter, and 5 points in this quarter, all 33 points.

In the fourth quarter, Popovich asked the players to get nervous and not let the Rockets score easily.The Spurs did it, but they couldn't score easily.

With Yao Ming not on the court, McGrady led the team. He was restricted by Bowen on the offensive end, and his efficiency was relatively low. He made 4 of 1 shots in two points and only scored 2 points.

But the Spurs' offense is also average, only scoring 4 points.Manu Ginobili, the starting point of the second team, was uncomfortable being defended by McGrady in the second half of today, and this meeting will also stumble.

With 10 minutes remaining in the game, the Spurs led by one point.After the two sides switched back to the main lineup, the Spurs advanced by two goals, but the Rockets quickly responded.The score has been very anxious, and the point difference jumps between rounds.

In the first few rounds, Yao Ming scored three goals when he was still physically strong, helping the team lead by 3 points.But in the end, his physical strength declined sharply, and he missed consecutively.

He played for a short time today, resting for 2 minutes in each quarter. He has played 35 minutes and scored 41 points.

With 5 minutes left in the game, taking advantage of Yao Ming's drop in shooting percentage, the Spurs slightly opened the score to 4 points, but then what Popovich was worried about happened.McGrady performed three consecutive rounds, with a layup, two free throws and a three-point assist. The Rockets scored 7 points in a row.

The Spurs missed both shots, and when Li Chongxiao was sent to play again, this time he was not only a player to defend McGrady, but was also entrusted by Popovich with the important task of offense.

Because only he can be trusted.Among the remaining players on the bench, Devon Brown is not available, Brent Barry is playing badly today, and Udri is still a little tender.

Li Chongxiao scored 15 points today, his performance was as stable as ever, and he also did a very good job on the defensive end.

Moreover, his physical strength is superb. Ginobili, who will be replaced, is exhausted. Li Chongxiao, who played 2 minutes more than Ginobili, is still alive and well.

In this game, both sides played very tough, and the referee's whistle was relatively loose, so the confrontation was very fierce.In addition, the score has not been opened, and both sides are playing very focused. At this point, the physical strength of the players on both sides is exhausted.

For the Spurs, Ginobili didn't talk about it, Parker was too tired to stick out his tongue, and Bowen was shared by Li Chongxiao, so he could still stay on the court, but he couldn't keep up with McGrady's footsteps in defense.

Fortunately, Nesterovic can play against Yao Ming, who is physically exhausted, so Duncan is liberated.

In this round, Li Chongxiao and Duncan picked and rolled, facing Yao Ming's defense, boldly chose to break through.After passing Yao Ming, he faked a real pass, evaded McGrady's supplementary defense, and threw the ball to Duncan for an empty contact.

The Rockets attacked, facing Bowen with sloppy feet, McGrady forcibly overtook and made a layup.Popovich hurriedly directed Li Chongxiao and Bowen to switch defenders.

In the next round, Li Chongxiao continued to pick and roll with Duncan, but McGrady couldn't keep up at all, allowing Li Chongxiao to make a layup.

With 1 minute and 49 seconds left in the game, the Spurs chased the point difference to only one point.

McGrady's physical strength is not good either. He has played for 43 minutes. The previous few shots were limp. The last breakthrough exhausted his last strength.In this attack, facing Li Chongxiao's defense, he tried to shake off and shoot, but was blocked by Li Chongxiao.

Nesterovic picked up the rebound, but was interfered by Yao Ming and failed to play the ball immediately.The Spurs are still wobbly playing positional warfare.

At this time, Popovich on the sidelines signaled Parker to hand the ball to Duncan for singles.But Duncan also played 40 minutes today and spent a lot of energy on defense, so he couldn't play anymore.Facing Yao Ming's defense, he missed the shot.

The Rockets attacked, and McGrady wanted to end the game too much. After consuming 20 seconds, he chose a three-pointer.

With a sound of "bang dang", the ball hit the blue neck and bounced out.But Nesterovic of the Spurs made a mistake. He failed to block Yao Ming, and the latter put the ball into the basket. The Rockets still led by three points.

The Spurs attack, replacing Bowen and replacing Ginobili.This time McGrady really tried his best, he followed Ginobili back and forth.After finally waiting for the latter to receive the ball, time is running out.

Ginobili broke through McGrady, who couldn't run, and went inside. Facing Yao Ming, who couldn't jump up and could only raise his hands, he chose to throw.

The ball hit the outside of the basket, Duncan missed a tip-up, and the rebound was eventually picked up by Yao Ming.

Popovich nearly fainted, and this time Nesterovic made another mistake, trapping Juwan Howard and allowing Duncan to put it back.But after Duncan missed a tip-up, instead of blocking Yao Ming, he chose to continue to block Juwan Howard, overlapping with Duncan's position.

With 39 seconds left in the game, the Rockets led by 3 points and still had the ball.

The Spurs no longer had a timeout. They didn't dare to foul immediately, so they could only strengthen their defense, hoping to prevent the Rockets from attacking this time, and then scored a quick goal.

At this moment, Li Chongxiao was single-handedly defending McGrady, and the Spurs didn't dare to double-team, otherwise McGrady passed the ball, and the rest of the Rockets might kill the game.

This round took up to 20 seconds, and McGrady dribbled the ball and wanted to rush in.But Li Chongxiao was very tough to fight with his body.If it was the start of the game, he might not be able to hold it, but this time he has a physical advantage, and McGrady was forced to stop.

Seeing this, Yao Ming came over to do a pick-and-roll, but Ginobili came directly to double-team. McGrady was forced to stop the ball, and the passing route was also cut off, so he had to jump up and pass the ball.

He wanted to pass it to Yao Ming, but he was a little too big, and Yao Ming didn't have the energy to jump right now.So the ball passed Yao Ming's fingertips and fell into Duncan's hands.

Li Chongxiao rushed to the front court like an arrow from the string, Duncan passed the ball vigorously, assisted his teammates to face the unguarded half court, and easily came up and succeeded.

Yao Ming chased two steps forward, but couldn't run anymore.But McGrady stopped after only one step. He turned around and opened his hands to Yao Ming, frowned, and blamed Yao Ming for not being able to catch the ball with a questioning face.

Yao Ming bent over to explain something, McGrady shook his head, lowered his hands, and walked to the bench.

Facing a point difference of only one point, the conservative Van Gundy also used up the last timeout.

With 17 seconds left in the clock, the Rockets still lead by one point. As long as they have the ball, as long as they don't make mistakes, the game will be basically won.

Juwan Howard serves, he has height and vision.McGrady got the ball smoothly in the backcourt and passed it to David Wesley in the frontcourt.The Spurs still wanted to defend against a wave. They didn't foul the first time, but just stepped forward to press.

McGrady quickly ran across the half court and got the ball again in the upper right corner. Li Chongxiao and Bowen rushed up to double-team at the same time. Four hands interfered with McGrady and blocked his passing vision, but there was no direct foul yet.

Yao Ming rushed out from the inside again, and he had gotten rid of Nesterovic.The only teammate McGrady could see was Yao Ming, but he chose to ignore Yao Ming and believe in himself.

He wanted to dribble the ball back, but as soon as the ball landed, Li Chongxiao dived to the top, got the ball into his hands, and passed the ball to Bowen from between McGrady's legs immediately.

Bo Wen wanted to pass the fast break at the first time, but Yao Ming's huge figure stood in front of him.The Rockets' guards also ran to the half court, and he quickly gave the ball to Parker before McGrady made the encirclement.

After passing the ball, Li Chongxiao wanted to break fast, climbed a few steps and slid to the ground. After Parker stabilized the ball, he stood up with both hands and feet.

The audience at the scene cheered after Li Chongxiao stole the ball, and then quickly stopped.With 10 seconds left, everyone stood nervously, staring intently.

Parker hit a pick-and-roll, but David Wesley stalked him around Duncan.

Parker wants to pass to Duncan, but Duncan has been pestered by Yao Ming.Nesterovic was caught by Juwan Howard, and Bowen couldn't run.

Li Chongxiao walked McGrady around twice, but found that he still couldn't get rid of it.He simply ran to a position two meters away from the three-point line and waited.

In the last few seconds, Parker chose to break through forcefully, but David Wesley, with his rich experience, kept getting stuck and refused to give up his speed.

Facing the crowded inside lane, Parker didn't dare to gamble, so he could only go to the other side of the three-point line and throw the ball to Li Chongxiao.

If McGrady has read some news about Li Chongxiao, he must know that he has the ability to shoot in this position.But how could such an indifferent and arrogant person pay attention to a rookie + substitute.

According to the conventional defensive method, he guarded the three-point line, two steps away from Li Chongxiao.Li Chongxiao dribbled the ball, but McGrady took half a step back, pretending to defend against a breakthrough.

Li Chongxiao was not polite, and time did not allow him to be polite.

Bending, bending legs, jumping, shaking wrists, all in one go.

As soon as the ball was shot, Li Chongxiao turned around without even looking at it. He raised his head, raised his hands and began to celebrate.

When McGrady saw Li Chongxiao's shot, he didn't even jump up, but turned half-turned to look at the basket.

The attention of all the players and spectators on and off the court was also attracted by the orange ball, and their eyes moved quickly and slowly with it.

Lights on and the ball goes straight into the hoop!
The scene boiled up, and the roof was about to be blown off.

The Spurs players who had looked tired just now came back to life, scrambling to rush to Li Chongxiao, celebrating recklessly.

The fans at the scene sang and danced, celebrating loudly.The big screen at the scene began to replay the goal, and the sharp-eyed audience suddenly discovered Li Chongxiao's actions after the shot, and the cheers turned into exclamations.

The Spurs players who were still celebrating were a little surprised by the sound of the scene. Except for Duncan who continued to touch his hand, the others temporarily let go of the ravaged Li Chongxiao and raised their heads one after another.

When the teammates saw the camera on the screen clearly, they all stared wide-eyed for a second, then frantically knocked Li Chongxiao to the ground, pressed him on top, and started a new round of tossing.

The Rockets players all started to leave the arena and walked towards the locker room passage. They were also attracted by the exclamation of the audience. When they saw what was on the screen clearly, they looked at each other in blank dismay.

Yao Ming shook his head and smiled wryly, while McGrady's face was livid and his veins were exposed. Tomorrow's headline basketball news, he will appear in the background like a clown.

The Spurs don't care so much from the team to the fans. Their team made McGrady's background once, and now it's McGrady's turn to be the background of the Spurs players.

(End of this chapter)