This striker is a bit of a monster

Chapter 334 Returning to Salt Lake City

On November 11, after a two-day break, the Charlotte Bobcats came to the West to play an away game again, which was also the second game of the road trip.

The opponent is the Utah Jazz.

In the past few years, the Charlotte Bobcats' games in Salt Lake City have been mixed, but almost every game has been very difficult.

Although the Utah Jazz team has never been involved in a championship since its establishment in 1974 and joined the NBA. Olajuwon took his Houston Rockets to the top of the NBA twice.

It can be said that Utah's black and white double evil, Karl Malone, who is second in the scoring list, and John Stockton, the historical assist king (15000+ assists are unprecedented, and it is rare to come later), have become history. The famous uncrowned king.

The number 12 and 32 retired jerseys have been flying over the Salt Lake City Arena for some years.

More than ten years have passed since the old black and white double evil alliance.

Today's Salt Lake City insiders have become Deron Williams and Carlos Boozer.

It is still the familiar pick-and-roll formula, and coach Sloan is still coaching in this team.

The Northwest Division has always been known for its wildness and tenacity, and the Utah Jazz team under the old coach has brought this temperament to the extreme.

I still remember the playoffs of the 06-07 season three years ago. After the Houston Rockets won Tianwangshan again, the Utah Jazz won G6 and G7 consecutively, which broke the hearts of countless Chinese fans.

Three years later, the Utah Jazz is still one of the devil's home courts that many teams and players have nightmares about.

This team, which has never been known for its talent and magnificence, is as competitive as ever in the West under the guidance of Jerry Sloan.

Rigorousness, discipline, and teamwork are synonymous with this slightly under-starred team.

Zhou Lin played 3 games on this field before this season, averaging 16.3 points, 5.7 assists and 6.3 rebounds per game, and his three-point shooting percentage was less than 32%, especially the shooting percentage was far lower than his career average.

This is a team that is more difficult to deal with than the Denver Nuggets. Although the traditional pick-and-roll style of play is old, it is still used. Last season, it averaged 103.6 points per game, which is one of the few in the league. A team with a three-digit scoring average, on the defensive end, although they do not have the iron-blooded defense such as the Spurs Pistons or the Magic, it is also a team with a clear division of labor and a compatible and orderly team.

I still remember that Yao Ming was embarrassed by Carlos Boozer's shooting on the defensive end, and Tracy McGrady, who had just lost his scoring crown, was also embarrassed by Kirilenko.

The old-fashioned positional team is also much more stable than the Denver Nuggets.

And this game is also a very special game for Zhou Lin, because Zhou Lin is about to reach a milestone in the fourth season of his career.

As of now, Zhou Lin has played a total of 243 regular season games and has scored 4988 points. In other words, as long as Zhou Lin can score 12 points in this game, Zhou Lin will reach the goal of breaking 5000 points in his career. milestone.

Zhou Lin, who averaged close to 30+ points per game this season, has not scored less than 23 points in any game this season. In other words, breaking 5000 in this game is almost a certainty.

Zhou Lin is also the first player in the 2006 rookie class to reach the 5000-point mark. Among the players in the same period, Rudy Gay, who is closest to Zhou Lin, has currently scored 4125 points, which is more than 800 points lower than Zhou Lin. Normally, Rudy Gay would get a milestone of 5000+ in the middle and late stages of the schedule.

The two are also the only two players in the 2006 rookie class who scored more than 4000 points. Brandon Roy ranked fourth, because he missed too many games in his career, and currently only has 3045 points.

The NBA is a league that pays great attention to milestone game days. Of course, scoring 5000+ points is not a particularly important milestone in the NBA, but for young players, this will definitely be a day that will be remembered.

Now Zhou Lin is 22 years old and 249 days old.

If Zhou Lin achieves this milestone, then he will be the fourth youngest Mr. 5000 in history.

排在周林前面的是勒布朗.詹姆斯的21岁22天，卡梅隆.安东尼的21岁292天，以及德怀特.霍华德的22岁81天。

Being able to stand side by side with these players is enough for Zhou Lin to be recorded in history.

You must know that among the three players in front of Zhou Lin, two are high school champions, and the only player who has ever played in the NCAA. Carmelo Anthony is the absolute scoring core of Denver. In the name of a player, he is a high-quality scorer.

In contrast, in the first season, Zhou Lin was used more as a space-type fourth position, and in the next few seasons, Zhou Lin was not a player who used scoring as the only means of the game. As the highest scoring season of his career, he averaged just over 23 points per game.

And Zhou Lin's fourth position will soon be broken by the man carrying the schoolbag.

In his rookie season he was able to average 20+ per game, and in the second season he directly broke the 25+ average.

It is just as terrifying.

This is the first meaningful milestone in Zhou Lin's career, so Zhou Lin's family and friends came to Salt Lake City on this trip.

Even in the away game, someone has already prepared the KT board, which says the fourth youngest Mr. 5000+.

Of course, victory is the most important thing. It has never been an easy task to stage a celebration banquet on the ground in Salt Lake City.

However, this season's Utah Jazz played very averagely at the beginning of the season. They have only won three of the seven games so far, and they are currently outside the playoff threshold.

Of course, in the lost games, most of the opponents were very strong, including the Nuggets who had won all before, the Houston Rockets and the Dallas Mavericks in the top three in Texas.

Of course, this is also related to some minor injuries of the team's current players. Marksman Korver and inside substitute Costa Koufus are both on truce.

After the short pleasantries, the starting rosters of both sides have been determined.

Utah Jazz: Deron Williams, Ronnie Brewer, Andrei Kirilenko, Mohamed Okur, Carlos Boozer.

Charlotte Bobcats: Zhu Holiday, Brandon Roy, Zhou Lin, David Lee, Yi Jianlian.

Raymond Felton, who had shoulder discomfort after the last game against Denver, didn't follow the team to Salt Lake, so Jrue Holiday was pushed into the starting job up.

Yi Jianlian won the jump ball duel with Okur, helping the Charlotte Bobcats get the first wave of the ball.

Now that Huomi thinks of Okur, it can be said that she hates it too much.

As a meat shield player, Yao Ming was mainly defended by him back then.

His characteristic is comprehensiveness, but his weakness is that his speed is slow, but no matter how slow he is, he must be faster than Yao Ming.

And Yao Ming still can't match up with Okur. Once Okur goes beyond the three-point line, he must switch defenses, and then switching defenses is a complete dislocation.

To say that Okur, like his Turkish fellow Turkoglu and Ilyasova, has a long-range shooting range that is against the times, and at the same time has the ability to guard the inside line similar to Asik, which is completely two kinds of Turkish basketball. combination of skills.

Of course, he is also standing at the pinnacle of Turkish basketball. After all, he won the NBA championship with the Pistons in 04.

It can be said that if the UAE can gain weight and Okur's athletic ability can be improved, the dialogue between the two this season will be like a mirror confrontation.

The Bobcats have a lot of off-ball screens here, but today's quality is not particularly high.

The first wave of the ball was not given to Zhou Lin. The young Holiday broke through to the basket and faced Deron Williams, who was stronger than him, and Carlos Boozer in front of him. Double flanking, the final throw was also obviously crooked a lot.

After Carlos Boozer got the rebound, Deron Williams didn't fight back immediately.

Now grinding the ground is still king.

In particular, the Jazz have a good positional capital. Whether Deron Williams and Carlos Boozer or Muhammad Okur are doing pick-and-rolls, there are many opportunities to appear.

In this round, Carlos Boozer received a pass from Deron Williams, tilted his machine gun, and directly hit the basket.

The matchup between Boozer and David Lee can be regarded as a complete match. Both of them can be regarded as players who are good at attacking but not good at defending in the fourth position, especially Carlos Boozer's 2.06 meters height. No matter how you look at it, some water has leaked out.

There is not much difference in tonnage between the two, but Carlos Boozer's most outstanding feature is his 219cm wingspan, which is one of the reasons why his shots are difficult to block.

This kind of mid-range ability to shoot behind the head is also considered a must in the league.

But looking back, David Lee also quickly responded on the offensive end. David Lee's footwork around the basket is better than that of Carlos Boozer, and as a left-hander, David Lee The offense is also very uncomfortable for many inside defenders.

They were both at the beginning of the game, and they both had elements of probing. The Bobcats didn't play like they did in the previous six games, with a rhythm of punching the master to death with quick punches, because the Jazz The rhythm of the side pressure is too hard.

Zhou Lin attacked for the first time, and the ball didn't reach him until you came and I went back and forth for several rounds.

Today, Zhou Lin's score will be remembered by many fans and even media commentators. With 12 points, according to the past, Zhou Lin may reach a record of 5000+ points in the first half.

But Kirilenko, who is standing in front of him now, doesn't think so. Kirilenko is currently a player who is difficult for Zhou Lin to use indiscriminate singles.

With a height of 206cm, he has a terrifying wingspan of 228cm, which is even longer than that of Yao Ming, who is 226cm.

Compared with Zhou Lin, who has a wingspan of 210cm, it can be seen by the naked eye that he has grown a lot. You must know that Zhou Lin's standing height is obviously a little taller than Kirilenko.

This is a pair of arms that have tortured McGrady, and countless superstars have suffered from him.

In the 2003-04 season, Kirilenko ranked fourth in the league in steals and fifth in blocks, becoming the first player in NBA history to enter the top five in both technical statistics.

Then, in the 04-05 season, Kirilenko was also one of the few players who won the block leader as a forward.

In the 04-05 and 05-06 seasons, he averaged more than 3 blocks per game for two consecutive seasons, which made many insiders feel ashamed.

However, Kirilenko, who entered the league in 1999, is no longer in the best condition at the moment. Although he is only 28 years old, his statistics are constantly shrinking. Last season, his most characteristic blocks, Reduced again, from 1.5 times to 1.1 times.

However, facing the upstarts of the league, Kirilenko is still the best quality inspector.

In the past few seasons, Zhou Lin and Kirilenko had a total of 4 head-to-head confrontations. Except for Kirilenko scoring 32 points at home, they failed to score 20 points in the other three games. This time, if Zhou Lin wanted to score 5000+, he had to pry Kirilenko's ten fingers off.

However, on the first attack, Zhou Lin's breakthrough layup was blocked by Kirilenko.

"You should have deducted it!"

"Be more aggressive."

Larry Brown shook his head and muttered when he saw his disciple was blocked.

If it was a powerful dunk, Kirilenko's slender arm probably wouldn't be able to cover it.

"I think your record should be saved for the next game!"

Kirilenko stepped back and said to Zhou Lin.

Now many fans and the media are looking forward to Zhou Lin's score breaking 5000+, but Kirilenko wants to be this villain for his home team.

"This is not the time for AK."

Zhou Lin shrugged his shoulders and said, "That's right. It's been a long time since I met a monster with wingspan like you. Also, it's a good thing to sound the alarm for myself."

"……Um?"

"You know, the more troublesome an opponent is, the more excited I am."

Consecutive victories, and most of them are victories like mercury pouring down the ground, and Zhou Lin himself is scoring like a bag. This season, the Bobcats started so smoothly. Once they enter the greenhouse, it is normal for the players to slack off.

And Kirilenko's block also gave Zhou Lin some appropriate blows on the psychological level, which happened to excite Zhou Lin.

"I don't mind being the villain in the comics!"

Kirilenko responded to Zhou Lin with a smile, and took advantage of the trend to run back and received Boozer's cut-in goal.

He was about to raise his hand for three points, but at this moment a yellow flash appeared.

With a snap, Kirilenko's outside three-pointer was shot flying.

It was Zhou Lin's defense block!
Wingspan is not enough, bounce to make it up!

"Give it back to you!"

Zhou Lin looked at Kirilenko and said: "If there is no challenge, I don't think I would like such a milestone. Thank you for the impression you left on me."

(End of this chapter)