Junior Basketball says

Chapter 323 Metropolis Chapter 321 Jedi Counterattack
After defending two home games, the Timberwolves will go to San Antonio again to play an away game. Everyone of them knows that this game must be more difficult than the previous four games combined.Now the Spurs, who are the Western Conference regular season champions this season, have been forced into a corner. If they don't want to be hacked, they must put in [-]% of their efforts.

In the history of the NBA, there are very few cases in which the playoffs fell behind 1 to 3 and finally completed the reversal, and it only happened 8 times in total.The earliest one dates back to the Eastern Conference finals in 1968. The Celtics pulled three consecutive games and eliminated the top 1ers in the Eastern Conference after falling behind 3 to 76 to advance to the finals. In the end, they successfully won the championship that year.

The most recent one was in 2006, which was also the first round of the Western Conference playoffs.That season, Kobe went down to earth like a god, leading the Lakers to win 3 games in a row after losing the first game in Phoenix. He thought he could advance, but the Suns didn't agree.Next, Kobe suffered a chokehold defense in Game 5, scored 6 points and 50 rebounds in Game 8, scored 7 points in Game 38 again, the Suns reversed and advanced, and also avenged their reversal by the Lakers in the 1970 Western Conference Semifinals.

But now the Timberwolves' hard power cannot be compared with the Spurs. If they are not careful, they will be nailed to the pillar of shame in history.The main reason why the Timberwolves were able to overwhelm the Spurs in this round of the series is that they found the Spurs' weakness and used their own methods to stab this weakness fiercely.

If the Spurs can hide or even eliminate this weakness in the shortest time, the Timberwolves will definitely not be able to defeat the Spurs head-on.McHale was very worried that Popovich would make full use of the rest time to crack the Timberwolves' routine, so he repeatedly emphasized not to think about going back to the home court to advance, as long as he can kill the opponent, he can't be soft.

Popovich and the Spurs felt a lot of pressure. Logically, they should have broken into the second round or even the Western Conference Finals. They didn't expect that they would be in danger of capsizing in the gutter in the first round.Spurs fans are loyal, but it is precisely because they are so loyal that the Spurs cannot afford to be hacked, which may cause their reputation to plummet.

Of course, those teams that have encountered black eights are still alive and well, and there are still only a lot of fans who support them, but the Spurs don't want the same thing to happen to them, which will make them feel guilty for a lifetime .

In this mentality, the Spurs players can be described as the same enemy, they are holding back their energy and want to give the Timberwolves a painful failure.However, they did not change the starting lineup. Popovich feels that this new starting lineup is still very useful. As long as the players can give full play to their strength, it will not be a problem to win the Timberwolves from afar at the Spurs' home court.

The main scoring point of the Spurs is still GDP. Popovich hopes that they will not be bound by the lineup and score in the best way.Whether it's Parker's breakthroughs, throws, Ginobili's European steps, three-pointers, or even Duncan's post-up singles and mid-range shots, they are all scoring methods that the Spurs use frequently. This game depends on them. There are three.

The local fans in San Antonio didn't have any good feelings for the Timberwolves. After all, the opponent humiliated the Spurs with a big score of 3 to 1, which is absolutely unforgivable for them.At this time, it is completely useless to say that friendship is first and competition is second. The Spurs fans just want to boo all their anger to the Timberwolves who came from afar.

The Timberwolves team had already expected the attitude of the home fans. Although the boos were loud, their expressions did not change much, and they directly regarded these boos as meaningless noise.The easy wins of the previous three consecutive games have given them a psychological advantage, and it is only natural to ignore the boos of the home fans.

But after the start of the game, Xu Hao and his friends felt tremendous pressure. The Spurs seemed to have given up their proud team spirit and played superstar basketball instead. The ball does it by itself, and Jefferson and Blair help them in every possible way. It can be said that there is no cooperation at all.

But it happened that this method of playing cards that did not follow the rules received miraculous results.From the first quarter, the GDP combination showed a fiery touch, no matter how they shot, and they were often able to make an Answer Ball after the Timberwolves scored.However, the Timberwolves players felt weirdly cold today, as if their shooting bags were left in Minneapolis. Only Xu Hao can keep scoring. Whether the others can put the ball into the basket is basically a matter of concern. Can rely on luck.

McHale could only sit on the sidelines and sulk. He wanted to take all the main players except Xu Hao off the court and teach them a lesson. Things like missing an empty layup in a 1-on-0 game could happen. I really don’t know what they were doing on the court. .

Xu Hao also felt very helpless. As the team's starting point guard, it is one of his jobs to distribute the ball. Soon he finds it difficult, so what if you can get the ball open?Your teammates can't make the shot!This assist can't be brushed down...

In the first quarter, the Spurs took a 35-30 lead by relying on the strong performance of GDP. Since Popovich always kept any two players in the GDP combination on the court, they made persistent efforts and scored 31 points in the second quarter, while the Timberwolves only had 25 points.Such a score made the fans completely crazy, and only the shouts of "MVP! MVP!" could be heard in the entire AT&T Center.

The Timberwolves also tried to counterattack in the second half, but Ginobili hit consecutive unreasonable three-pointers from the flanks, which greatly damaged the team's morale.If there is anyone else in the Spurs who can get Popovich's permission to shoot recklessly in the way he is used to, it must be Ginobili, known as the "Demon Sword", who also repaid the coach's trust.

Although Xu Hao scored 27 points, 8 rebounds and 5 assists, he was unable to prevent the Timberwolves from losing 92 to 108. This is the first time they have not scored more than 40 points in this round of the series.However, anyone with a discerning eye knows that the Timberwolves' low score is not because of how good the Spurs' defense is, but because they have spread their bad touch to the entire team. How could the combination not lose the game?

Fortunately, the Timberwolves still lead 3-2 after this game, but they don't have much time left. If they can't win the Spurs at home in the sixth game, the outcome of this round of the series is really hard to say ...

(End of this chapter)