warrior godfather

Chapter 705 Silent Clay

Zizi-bang-bang-crack!

After Harden and Capela picked and rolled, they passed Olynyk and broke through to the inside. Before the arrival of Antetokounmpo and Leonard's help defense, he flicked his wrist and threw the ball to the left corner. Ariza.

Leonard looked back and didn't care anymore, and the other Warriors players didn't mean to rotate to fill the position. Ariza got a completely open opportunity.

But Ariza hesitated, adjusted his rhythm well, and then raised his hand to throw a three-pointer.

He doesn't want to shoot, but in the Rockets, as long as he gets an open three-pointer, he must shoot. This is the core requirement of D'Antoni's tactical system.

Bang!

Not surprisingly, this unguarded three-pointer deviated from the trajectory, hit the edge of the basket, bounced high, and fell into the hands of Antetokounmpo who recovered.

Ariza shook his hand angrily. This was his seventh three-pointer of the game.

Previously, including this time, he took a total of 9 three-pointers and only made 2. The shooting rate was terribly low.

But he didn't have time to regret. After Antetokounmpo got the rebound, he turned around and strode forward, and the Warriors turned from defense to offense, setting off a counterattack.

Ariza retreated in a hurry, and Capela and Gordon also quickly returned to defense.

But Antetokounmpo was too fast. He rushed across the half court in three or two steps and rushed into the inside. Capela and Gordon subconsciously shrunk to the penalty area and rotted in front of Antetokounmpo. Ariza also rushed from behind. Antetokounmpo, surround him.

Antetokounmpo's impact is too terrifying. As long as he is given enough space to start, he will turn into a ferocious monster, as if he is about to eat people. Under the panic of the Rockets players, the defensive matchup is chaotic.

But after Antetokounmpo attracted the defense of three people, he didn't head up hard. Instead, he suddenly turned halfway while traveling at high speed, and threw the ball to Curry who followed up on the right.

Anderson's footsteps were not fast, and he took a step back to defend. He followed Curry. After Curry received the ball, he raised his hand to shoot, and he rushed to block Curry's shot.

Curry collected the ball to pass Anderson's defense, then calmly aimed and made a three-pointer.

brush!
The basketball crossed a wonderful trajectory and entered the net hollow.

"Yeah!!!"

"Chef Curry!"

"MVP!"

There was thunderous applause at the Datong Center, and the auditorium was boiling. The white-haired old man, the young man flushed with excitement, and the freckled child all cheered selflessly.

Curry danced, with a big smile on his face.

"Di-"

The referee blew the whistle, D'Antoni called a timeout, and the Rockets players on the court lowered their heads and walked to the bench in silence amidst the noise of the court.

Ariza looked up at the big screen in mid-air, and silently followed behind his teammates with an extremely depressed expression on his face.

At this time, the game has progressed to 2 minutes and 27 seconds of the fourth quarter. With Curry making this chasing three-pointer, the Warriors lead the Rockets by 124 points at 105:19, and the victory is set.

This three-pointer became the last straw that broke the camel's back. D'Antoni stopped insisting, replaced the main force, replaced the substitute, and conceded the loss.

Zhang Yu also tacitly changed into the third team, allowing Brogdon and Zhou Qi to experience the feeling of the playoffs, and the game entered garbage time.

最终，勇士以128:112大胜火箭16分，大比分1:0领先。

After the game, the Warriors players looked relaxed, talking and laughing, and walked into the player tunnel. Zhang Yu and Mike Brown walked behind, laughing and discussing the tactics of the game, and they were also very relaxed.

For the Warriors, this was an expected victory. The media hyped Harden as a lone hero and the Rockets were sharp, but they didn't pay attention to the Rockets at all.

The Rockets' counterattack + V-shaped pick-and-roll are all tactics that the Warriors are familiar with, and they are not afraid at all.

When Zhang Yu was at Butler University, he carefully studied D'Antoni's tactics and used them for reference.

Later, Zhang Yu entered the Warriors, and the lineup was broken. He could only let Curry play the core of the ball, mainly D'Antoni's system, supplemented by some passes and cuts. Until now, the V-shaped pick-and-roll is also one of the most commonly used tactics by the Warriors. one.

It will break if you know how to use it, and the magic ball of the rocket is so serious that it is even easier to break.

Zhang Yu locked Harden, the only offensive driving point of the Rockets, and Capela, Anderson, one inside and one outside. The scoring of Gordon and Ariza is nothing to be afraid of.

Harden was in excellent form today. Under the strict defense of the Warriors, he still scored a quasi-triple-double of 25 points, 8 assists and 9 rebounds.

However, his shooting percentage is only 44.6%. Although it is not low in the playoffs, it is far inferior to Curry, who scored 49.4 points, 35 assists, 6 rebounds and 4 steals with a 2% shooting percentage.

And Harden also sent up to 6 turnovers, 4 of which were intercepted or blocked by Leonard, Antetokounmpo, and Green. The Warriors' defense still gave him great restrictions.

The most important thing is that Harden's scoring can be said to be "given" by the Warriors. His scoring is intermittent, and most of them are obtained when they are behind by more than 10 points. The threat to the Warriors is very limited and cannot reverse the situation.

In Curry's 35 minutes, 15 points were scored in the third quarter, which opened the score in one fell swoop and established the victory for the Warriors.

In addition, Leonard scored 25 points and Antetokounmpo scored 22 points, both of which performed very well.

The three scored 20 points, which shows that the Warriors' offensive firepower is only terrifying.

However, Zhang Yu's tactics were not very favorable to Clay, and he only scored 14 points.

In this year's playoffs, Clay's low-scoring games have gradually increased.

His scoring method is mainly off the ball, and he needs to run without demand to create scoring opportunities. The higher the intensity of the game, the better the defense, the more complicated the running without the ball, and the harder it is to find scoring opportunities.

The Warriors now have three major scorers with the ball, Curry, Leonard, and Antetokounmpo. They can play fierce offenses without passing and cutting, and even the possession of the ball is a bit insufficient.

In the regular season, the defensive intensity is low, and he can run out of the open space casually. Clay can still maintain an average of 18.6 points per game. However, in the playoffs, as the opponent's defensive intensity increases, it becomes more difficult for Clay to run out of open space, and his scoring also drops. down.

From 17.9 points in the first round, to 16.5 points in the second round, and then to 14 points in this game, as the playoffs progressed, Clay's score became lower and lower.

After this round of the series, Clay doesn't know how much his scoring average will be, but he knows that it will be a lower number.

On the walk back to the locker room, Klay was the one with the least smile on his face.

He silently followed behind his teammates and did not speak to the others.

But the entire Warriors team was immersed in the joy of their first win in the Western Conference Finals. No one noticed his expression, thinking that he was just thinking about his own things as usual.

Silent, Clay returned to the locker room, took a shower, sat in his seat, and continued to be silent.

No one knew what he was thinking. Zhang Yu asked him to attend the post-match trust conference, but he remained silent.

During an interview, the reporter asked Clay to comment on his performance in this game. He was silent for a while, but avoided talking about it:
"We won this game, which is very important. The Rockets are an opponent that cannot be underestimated. A big lead can make us more calm in the next game..."

The reporter was a little surprised, but when he thought that it was Clay who answered the question, everything seemed reasonable again, so he didn't take it to heart. Instead, he took this question as an interesting fact that Clay answered a wrong question, and reported it.

The Warriors fans were also in a happy mood because of the big victory. After reading this report, they all laughed and ridiculed Clay:
"The funniest thing about Clay is that he doesn't know how funny he is..."

Then, they put the matter behind them.

What could be wrong with Clay?

……

On May 5, G16 of the Western Conference Finals kicked off at the Chase Center.

This game was exactly the same as in G1. The Rockets' V-shaped pick-and-roll didn't work, Ariza still didn't get back his touch, Anderson still didn't have a chance to shoot a three-pointer, Capela still couldn't find a route to attack the basket, and Harden still couldn't find a way to attack the basket. No plans to shoot mid-range.

D'Antoni did not sit still. He arranged more counterattack tactics. Since positional warfare is not easy to fight, he should use his old skills to play fast and use counterattacks to improve scoring efficiency.

Part of his goal was achieved. The Warriors were already playing fast. The Rockets increased their speed and the pace of the game became faster and faster. The two sides came and went, counterattacked for dunks, chased three-pointers, and made one-stop breakthroughs. The scene was dazzling, and the Rockets scored. Also improved a lot.

But the Rockets scored high, and the Warriors scored even higher.

The Warriors' defense is better than that of the Rockets, and their defense is solid. Many times, the Rockets seem to be playing lively, but they can't make shots. The high score is only because of more rounds and more shots in the game, but their offensive efficiency has not improved much.

On the other hand, the Warriors have a solid defense, a sharp counterattack, a combination of inside and outside, and multiple threats. The faster the pace of the game, the easier it is for the Warriors to score.

Clay, who only scored 14 points in the last game, scored 14 points in the halftime today. The open rhythm of the game gave him more opportunities to shoot and chase three-pointers, which is his strong point.

Curry and Antetokounmpo are even top counter-attackers. Curry's chasing three-pointer and Clay complement each other. Antetokounmpo rushes unstoppably. ferocious.

After the first half, the Warriors led the Rockets by 66 points 52:14.

In the third quarter, the Warriors scored 36 points in a single quarter, leading the Rockets by 102 points with 78:24.

In the fourth quarter, the Warriors' rotation continued to expand their lead.

Wiggins broke out and scored 5 points in 8 minutes, helping the team extend the lead to 29 points.

The Rockets had no fighting spirit, and D'Antoni did not make unnecessary struggles. The Warriors' main force clocked in three quarters, and the fourth quarter was all reduced to garbage time.

最终，勇士以129:106大胜火箭23分，大比分2:0领先。

The Warriors are all soldiers, with Curry 24 points, Clay 23 points, Leonard 15 points, Antetokounmpo 17 points, Wiggins 15 points, Bogdan 12 points, and six players from the team scored in double figures.

Green's performance was mediocre. Even in such a fast-paced game, his finishing ability was still unsightly, and he only scored 6 points.

As the playoffs gradually deepened, Green's presence on the court became weaker and weaker.

　I sat on the train all night last night, and I was catching up on sleep during the day. The update has been unstable in the past two days, and it will explode in two days as compensation.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)