God's hand behind the scenes

Chapter 72 The Moment of Vengeance
The ranking of the four major divisions of the NCAA is not based on record. Sometimes teams with bad records can be ranked at the top, while teams with good records can only be ranked at the back.This time Villanova was assigned to the West Division, the No. 2 seed in the division, and the game was played in Anaheim, southwestern California.

After seeing the list of 16 teams in the Western Conference, the eyes of several players who played for Villanova last season lit up.They still remember the team's helpless loss to the University of Arizona in the National Championship Final Four last season, and this year, the top seed in the West is this old enemy.

The rookies still don't understand why the seniors are so excited, but after they know the team's grievances with the University of Arizona last season, everyone's heart is full of flames.Isn't now the perfect time for revenge?As long as Villanova and Arizona pass the customs all the way, they will always meet in the Western Conference finals, and then they will be able to avenge their shame.

Chang Wei admired those old guys on the NCAA Basketball Championship selection committee. Whether it was intentional or not, Chang Wei insisted that their hearts were very dark, or that everything was in line with attention.As long as it is something that can attract the attention of fans, they are willing to do it. The replay of last season's semi-finals is a good gimmick.

But in order to complete the revenge of the University of Arizona, the first thing Villanova has to do is to ensure the victory of every game. The NCAA tournament is a very cruel single-elimination system. If you lose a game, please come back next year.So Villanova doesn't need any surprises, what they are after is to crush their opponents upright.

As the No. 2 seed in the Western District, Villanova's opponent in the first round is the University of San Francisco. Chang Wei doesn't think this team will pose any threat. After all, he doesn't remember any of the names on the roster.Besides, this is a team with a striker as the core. Dealing with this kind of team is Villanova's forte.

More importantly, judging from the personal data of the University of San Francisco players, this team may be biased towards individual singles. Except for guard Jamal Cobb who averaged 4 assists per game, no one on the team averaged more than 3 assists per game. [-] times.Rappers obviously saw this too, so he has already started to let the players practice full-court pressing tactics in advance.

At the beginning of the game, Villanova did not resort to a full-court press, but adopted a man-to-man defensive tactic.With the exception of Brown, who was a bit helpless against Cobb, everyone defended their opponents well.

The head coach of the University of San Francisco, Philip Matthews, was ashen-faced. If Cobb couldn't find the ball, it would be useless. This guy can only contribute 6.6 points per game this season, which is not even as good as some of the team's substitute players. His biggest role on the court is to pass the ball to his teammates and sort out the team's offense.But now no one can catch the ball, even if he barely catches the ball, there is no chance to make a shot, so Cobb's existence has become very tasteless.

Before the game, he always thought that Villanova would play against his team. To be honest, if the two sides really fought against each other, Matthews still believed that the team would have a chance to win.But I didn't expect that Villanova just didn't follow your plan, just to prevent all your scoring points, and it seemed to be quite effective.

The most irritating thing is that Villanova often speeds up on the defensive end, turning into an extremely oppressive full-court press. Such sudden changes have forced the University of San Francisco players to make mistakes many times, and what follows is McGrady or Battier's fast break counterattack.

The University of San Francisco fell behind by more than 20 points in the first half, and they have not been able to narrow the gap. In the end, they could only lose 58 points in a humiliating 97-39, creating the largest gap in the first round of the national championship.

After defeating the University of San Francisco, Villanova started the next round non-stop, this time their opponent was Illinois State, which upset the No. 7 seed University of Arkansas in the first round.Chang was startled when he saw the name of this school, but he quickly realized that this was not the University of Illinois, which became famous later on, but just Illinois State University, so there was no need to take it to heart, even if they finished the first round The same goes for the next gram.

The school, much like Syracuse, also had a core pair of wings: Rick Hill, who averaged 18.4 points and 7.5 rebounds per game, and Dan Muller, who averaged 13 points and 5.3 rebounds per game.

Facing such an opponent, Rappers straightforwardly took out the routine used in the Big East finals, let Battier and Brand match up against Muller and Hill, and then let McGrady act as a scoring arrow. Anyway, no one can Guard him.

McGrady did not disappoint the head coach. In fact, after being humiliated by Artest, he has developed a good habit of going all out in the face of any opponent, not to mention that the head coach deliberately told him before the start of the game Going to score crazy.McGrady scored 37 points in the game, also got 5 rebounds and 8 assists, helping the team end the game with a 13-point advantage.

Now that there is only one game left before the finals of the Western Conference, Chang Wei is delighted to see a familiar name from the roster of his next opponent, the University of Cincinnati—Kenyon Martin, the No. 2000 pick in the [-] draft in his previous life.Although this guy has always been more ambitious than paper, he is still an excellent inside player in the league.Today's Villanova is too strong, and Chang Wei only feels a little excited when he sees more famous stars in his previous life in the opponent's team.

Originally in this game, Rappers hoped that the team could open up the situation on the outside, but he did not expect Brand to take the initiative to ask for a fight the day before the game, hoping to score points desperately inside.Considering that Cincinnati's internal strength is relatively weak, Rappers readily agreed to his request, and clearly asked others to pass the ball to the low post as much as possible for Brand to play singles.

Martin was indeed a powerful power forward in his previous life, but now he is still a rookie averaging 9.9 points and 8.9 rebounds per game, and his skills are also rough.Brand showed off his footwork around the rim, hitting him with precision.There is no doubt that Brand is the most shining star in this game. He scored 27 points and 15 rebounds on the head of Martin, and also sent 5 assists and 2 blocks. With momentum, the team also advanced to the Western Conference Finals with a 9-point advantage.

In the other half, the University of Arizona also went all the way and won the last ticket to the finals. The semi-finals of last season's championship will be staged as everyone expected.

(End of this chapter)