NBA opening draw to twilight Shaquille O'Neal

Chapter 1126 The last madness, the Lakers think carefully

There are only 1 or 2 games left for each team, and the door to the playoffs has already been knocked on. In this final time, the media seized the time to report frantically on the seeded teams in the playoffs.

Under the momentum of the media, the air of the entire league seemed to be filled with a strong smell of gunpowder, and all the teams fell into the final madness.

On April 4, multiple focus battles broke out in the East.

The first is the Atlanta Hawks at home against the Charlotte Hornets.

For the Hornets, due to the lack of core player Kemba Walker, this makes the Hornets' offense very difficult, while the opponent's Eagles are all healthy, and the Eagles are doomed to lose.

Not long after the opening, after the two teams tied at 16, the Eagles established a lead with a 15:6 spurt. Howard scored 10 points in the first quarter.

After the first quarter, the Eagles led 38:26.

In the second quarter, the Eagles played a 12:0 spurt, once expanding the point difference to more than 20 points.

At halftime, the Eagles led 63:44.

In the third quarter, the Eagles always kept the point difference above 20 points, and after Sefolosha led the team to play a wave of 12:2 attacks in the fourth quarter, the Eagles have already led by 31 points, which also completely lost the suspense of the game.

In the end, the Eagles defeated the Hornets 103:76, ushering in 4 consecutive victories and also locked in the No.6 position in the regular season.

Howard contributed a double-double of 19 points and 12 rebounds tonight, and was named the best player in the game after the game.

The second is the contest between two playoff-level teams in the East: the Celtics at home VS Bucks.

This game did not live up to the media's publicity and the expectations of the fans. It was played with passion.

At the beginning of the game, Bucks player Antetokounmpo scored 7 points in a row, Celtics player Horford immediately scored 3 goals in a row, and the two teams started a confrontation.

Immediately afterwards, the two sides broke out in a three-point battle. After Crowder scored two consecutive three-pointers, Meck dunked Monroe consecutive hooks. With Vaughn soaring three-pointers, the Bucks scored 11:0 and led by 12 points.

After Green scored 4 points in a row, Teletovic hit a three-pointer at the buzzer, and the Bucks took the lead in the away game and ended the first quarter with a 36:25 lead.

Entering the second quarter, the talented young Celtics Brandon Ingram first made a fadeaway jumper and then a one-handed dunk, pulling his teammates back from the state of confusion, and began to launch frequent counterattacks.

When the official timeout was reached, the point difference continued to be stalemate at around 10 points.

Afterwards, the team boss "The Strongest 175 on the Surface" Thomas Jr. made two free throws and scored two three-pointers in a row. Johnson also made a strong layup. After Thomas Jr. made two free throws again, the Celtics played a 14-2 climax and ended the third quarter with a 57:56 lead.

In the second half, Beasley hit two jump shots in a row, and Ingram also made a mid-range shot in response. The two teams started a tug-of-war and led alternately.

Seeing that the game was in a tense moment, Johnson broke out suddenly, broke through the dunk and then made a strong hit. After Monroe responded with a hook at the basket, Olynyk scored a three-pointer to help the Celtics lead 80:78 to end the third quarter.

In the last quarter of the game, after the stalemate between the two teams, the Celtics' bench shoes suddenly broke out. Bradley dunked and layup. Olynyk, Crowder and Green scored three-pointers one after another.

After the second game, their regular season record came to 54 wins and 28 losses, and they locked in the first place in the Eastern Conference.

全场比赛，小托马斯13分4篮板8助攻、杰拉德·格林18分6篮板、克劳德16分5篮板、阿米尔·约翰逊16分5篮板、霍福德12分6篮板、布兰登·英格拉姆10分。

The Celtics had 6 players score in double figures tonight. This performance made the team coach Brad Stevens very satisfied.

In his basketball philosophy, the team's offense has to be played like this, instead of relying on one person to score crazy points, and others will only watch the show.

The thickness of the Celtics' terrifying bench stunned all the powerful players in the East, and made their vigilance against the Celtics reach a new peak.

The Miami Heat ushered in the final battle of the regular season today. They sat at home to meet the challenge of the menacing Washington Wizards.

In order to win the last chance of the playoffs, the Heat gave their all tonight and tried their best one by one. Finally, at their own home court, they defeated the Wizards 110:102 and won the victory of the last confrontation between the two sides this season.

As for the Wizards, the team has secured a place in the playoffs in advance, so the Wizards coach directly put Wall and Bill on the bench. The strategy of the Wizards game tonight is purely training.

Although the game was lost, the outstanding performance of the role players made the Wizards coaching staff quite satisfied, and it also made the Wizards look forward to the upcoming playoffs even more.

热火这边，德拉季奇28分5助攻、怀特塞德24分18篮板、詹姆斯-约翰逊12分8篮板。三人的出色发挥是热火今晚赢得比赛的关键。

But because the Pacers led by Paul George defeated the Nets in another game, the Heat had to regretfully lose the chance to enter the playoffs.

In the West, the most eye-catching game on the 11th is the strong dialogue between the Lakers and the Warriors.

Since both teams belong to California, this game can also be regarded as a California civil war.

Located in Los Angeles, the Lakers are one of the two traditional giants in the NBA. The team also has a combination of the Big Three such as Kobe, Paul, and Jiasao, which is a natural traffic gathering place.

The upstarts around the Warriors have risen in recent seasons, and have reached the Western Conference playoffs for two consecutive years. Although they lost to the Trail Blazers led by Wang Zelin in the end, no one can deny their strength.

What's more, they also introduced the league's super scorer Kevin Durant last summer. Together with Curry, Thompson and Green, they formed a unparalleled four-star cosmic brave. The offensive talent of the whole team was exaggerated to the point of overflow.

This all-meter live broadcast quickly attracted the attention of all basketball fans around the world.

But after the game really started, the fans felt a little disappointed again, because it was an anticlimactic game.

Throughout the first half, the Los Angeles Lakers, who came to visit the away game, showed the momentum to fight the Warriors for a bayonet, and they would never withdraw their sheaths without seeing blood.

The opponent put up such a battle, and the Warriors are naturally waiting for it, and because the Lakers are considered by the Warriors management as a potential opponent in the second round of the playoffs, Kerr did not let the core players paddle in this game, and played at a normal pace. .

After the opening, the two teams once fought to an 8:8 tie.Among them, Thompson and Curry hit three-pointers successively, and the splash launched a fierce offensive.

After that, Curry and Durant hit consecutive three-pointers, and the two led the Warriors to a wave of 13:2 attacks, expanding the point difference to more than 10 points.

As a last resort, Lakers coach Luke Walton requested a timeout to make adjustments.

After the timeout, Durant turned into a death scythe and began to harvest the game continuously. He scored 5 points in a row and scored 15 points in a single quarter, including three three-pointers.

And Green also hit his first goal tonight, and all the Big Four scored.

After the first quarter, the Warriors once widened the point difference to as many as 19 points, leading the Lakers 43:28.

After just one quarter, the Warriors' gorgeous offense like mercury pouring into the ground stunned all the Lakers players.

It turns out that when the jump shot is strong to a certain extent, it can also change the game.

Kobe and Paul's eyes were full of solemnity. They probably didn't say anything about it. The Lakers' rhythm will collapse so fast tonight.

No, to be exact, it's not that the Lakers' rhythm has collapsed, or that the Warriors on the opposite side went crazy at the beginning.

With 28 points in a single quarter, no matter what dimension you look at, the Lakers' game rhythm is not broken, but quite satisfactory.

The stretcher couldn't hold the whole team on the opposite side and opened the self-aiming, and the three-pointer was shot, just like the built-in navigation, quack accurate!
In the second quarter, the Lakers started with a 9:4 spurt, in which Kobe contributed 5 points, and the point difference was also narrowed to 10 points.

The Warriors requested a timeout.

After the timeout, it was Durant again. He took the lead in scoring with a jumper to help the Warriors open the situation.

When Durant hit a ball, it was like a chain reaction on the court. Curry immediately hit a logo ultra-long three-pointer, and then Thompson hit a short-range jumper.

The Warriors once again took control of the rhythm on the field and easily overwhelmed the Lakers.

这一节还剩2分11秒的时候，杜兰特再次挥舞镰刀连得7分，帮助勇士队半场结束，以64:50领先了14分。

Being 14 points behind is not too much, especially in this era of data explosion that is extremely advocating offense. It stands to reason that the Lakers will definitely launch another counterattack in the second half.

Unexpectedly, when they came back from the third quarter, people were surprised to find that Kobe Paul and his sister-in-law were all wearing jackets. Looking at this posture, it seemed that they were not going to play again.

"Are the Lakers planning to surrender now?"

The same thought flashed across everyone's minds instantly.

As the game progressed, seeing the Big Three of the Lakers sit comfortably on the bench as if they had taken root in their buttocks, and they never planned to upload.

On the court, the Warriors have led the Lakers by a full 25 points.

It wasn't until this moment that people finally believed that the Lakers had really surrendered.

This approach disappointed many Lakers fans. Many other spectators said that today's tickets were bought for nothing, especially the group of spectators who bought from scalpers, even stood up from their seats and yelled at the Lakers bench.

Of course, the Lakers naturally have his ideas in doing so.

In other words, the Lakers surrendered so decisively, maybe they are not stopping losses in time?

Look at how exaggerated the Warriors' three-pointer was in the last game, it went straight to [-]%!
Look at Kevin Durant's guy again, tonight it's like drinking Scarlett Johansson's bath water, the avatar Teddy keeps firing, the firepower is exaggerated to the extreme, scoring is like chopping melons and vegetables, and they can't stop at all.

Judging from the state of the Warriors' game tonight, the Lakers want to win tonight, unless the Big Three are all 10 years younger, and Kobe, Paul, and his sister-in-law all find their hands in their heyday, then it is possible to achieve a comeback.

However, no one can compete with the enemy of time. The Big Three of the Lakers are too old after all. Even if they break out in a short period of time, they can match the offense of the Lakers, but as long as the battle line is stretched, their endurance is far worse than that of young people.

So during the intermission, the Lakers, the coaching staff and the players in the away locker room decided to implement the second plan after some discussions.

Come to challenge the Warriors today. In fact, the Lakers have prepared two plans early on.

The first set is to fight if you can, and it is best to be upset.

If the team's playoffs can be kicked off in a way that upset the Warriors, it will also be a way for players to improve morale.

In the NBA playoffs, the competition is not only the hardware elements such as the talent and strength of the players, but also the software level competition, such as desire to win, ability to withstand pressure, team morale and so on.

Don't you see, in the history of the NBA playoffs, there has never been a lack of weak teams with low regular season records defeating strong teams with better regular season records and finally making it to the next round.

The cases of black eight, black seven, and black six in the past are the best evidence.

But if they can't beat the Warriors, then the Lakers can only start the second plan.

That is, voluntarily giving up the game.

There are two advantages to doing this. On the one hand, it can prevent the veterans of the Lakers from consuming too much energy. On the other hand, it is mainly beneficial to their opponents in the first round of the playoffs.

This is actually a little thought of the Lakers.

The Lakers are currently ranked fifth in the Western Conference. If this ranking is followed, their opponent in the first round of the playoffs will be the Houston Mosaics.

The main reason is that their ranking fell to sixth in the West, then their opponent in the first round of the playoffs will become the San Antonio Spurs.

Compared with the Mosaic team with two super scorers whose upper limit is unknown, the Lakers, after some careful consideration, are more inclined to face the San Antonio Spurs in the first round.

The Lakers and Spurs can basically be regarded as the two greatest teams since the 21st century.

In the first decade of the 21st century, from 10 to 00, the Lakers won 09 championships, the Spurs won 4 championships, and the Pistons, Heat, and Celtics won one each.

The two teams have won 10 championships in 7 years. If you count the championship in 2010, it will be 11 championships in 8 years, and its dominance can be seen.

Since the Lakers and Spurs are both in the Western Division, the two teams have fallen in love and killed each other countless times in the past ten years. The end result is that both sides know each other well.

Don't forget, Kobe once had a nickname called the Spurs Killer!
Prior to this, Kobe had met the Spurs in a total of 6 series in the playoffs, winning 4 of them.

In these 30 games, Kobe was called an iron man. He averaged 42.7 minutes per game, scored 28.2 points, 5.9 rebounds and 4.7 assists. His shooting percentage also reached 47.3%.

It is precisely because Kobe has defeated the Spurs many times in the playoffs, and his personal data is quite luxurious, so people call him the number one killer of the Spurs.

Even Spurs coach Simavich has publicly stated that Kobe is the most difficult player he thinks to release!
Considering the experience of the two teams playing against each other, as well as Kobe's inexplicable metaphysics that is easy to explode every time the Spurs, the Lakers immediately thought carefully and decided to pick the Spurs as their opponent in the first round of the playoffs.

All the players of the Lakers team have purple and gold blood flowing in their bodies. Even though the league is full of powerful players, they still have not cut off their ambitions to compete for the championship.

The Lakers championship has never been just a slogan!
(End of this chapter)