One Year Left to Play

Chapter 597: Chapter 183: Nothing Is Impossible in the World (Part 3)

"What do you mean by just letting go? What exactly did he understand?"

...

The collapse of confidence can sometimes be just that simple. The Lakers completely didn’t expect that after coming to the opponent’s home court, it seemed like the opponent had given up...

Richmond is indeed a player as tenacious as a rock, even when faced with injuries that could destroy athletic abilities, he fought on tenaciously.

From a style of early athletic play to a style of tonnage power and technique after a serious injury, he has always maintained the strength of a top star. Even after a serious injury, he was selected to the second team and won the All-Star MVP, but he has always been quite unlucky.

Richmond’s teammates never truly surpassed expectations. The TMC combination back in the day made people feel like the future was limitless, but then it broke apart even more inexplicably than the Dallas 3J. The Warriors, for some reason, decided to trade Richmond. If it was to shore up the inside game, it would make sense, since the Warriors’ inside game was indeed weak. But they traded Richmond for a small forward, and after the trade, the Warriors’ inside game was still weak, and the once super-strong firepower of the outside game was weakened.

In the first game of the series with the Lakers, Richmond inspired his teammates with fighting spirit, trying to replicate the Nuggets’ performance, but was crushed by Zhang Hao in the final quarter, directly losing their fighting will.

A 26-win difference was truly too much!

Unlike the previous game, in this one, the Kings were still working hard - after all, they were only trailing 0-1, but the all-out fighting spirit was gone.

This game Zhang Hao was still in the adaptation stage. During the game, his playstyle was very clear. During the starting phase, he focused on defending the opposing point guard. In the rotation phase, he actively protected the rim, boxed out, and grabbed rebounds, focusing on these aspects from the start to find opportunities to counterattack.

However, the game was not as close as the last one. After three quarters, the Lakers were leading the Kings by more than 20 points with a score of 78 to 53.

In the final quarter, Zhang Hao did not play. In the first three quarters, he played 29 minutes, scoring 15 points, grabbing 8 rebounds, dishing out 3 assists, and blocking 3 shots.

A very good performance, and he controlled turnovers better than in the last game.

In the end, the score was sealed at 98 to 82. The Lakers, carrying the mindset of "never getting upset in the first round," stepped onto the court and achieved a comfortable big win.

...

...

On April 28th, the morning after finishing the second game against the Kings, with a 2-0 lead, the Lakers arrived in Sacramento.

The Lakers’ state was very peculiar. If they had really lost to the Kings in the second game, they could have accepted it, and leading 2-0, they weren’t overly proud either. This was very different from how they would sometimes act spoiled during the regular season.

Last night, three other series also played their second game. The Magic had no suspense defeating the Hawks 106-95, making the series score 2-0.

The Pacers defeated the Pistons 102-94, luckily avoiding a 0-2 hole at home.

The teams with advantageous but shaky starts like the Pacers and Spurs stabilized their series in the second game. It was just the Malone and Stockton duo’s side that was pitiful. At 91-95, the Utah Jazz lost to the Rockets, trailing 0-2! Losing both their home games!

points, 8 rebounds, 4 assists, Olajuwon’s underdog journey started again! freewebnoveℓ.com

Seeing Olajuwon perform like this in another playoff after back-to-back championships, Zhang Hao finally understood why Barkley, even after the Rockets failed to defend their title, still had so much faith in Olajuwon that he would rather refuse a lucrative contract extension to go join him.

So fierce!

Just seeing Malone’s shooting performance, making 7 out of 21 shots for 19 points, Zhang Hao could feel Malone’s despair!

"Facing a peak-ending Olajuwon in the first round two years in a row, how unlucky must Malone be?"

At this moment, Zhang Hao started to believe in "fate." He came to this world and already brought quite some changes to the development of the NBA in this world, but Malone’s bad luck just couldn’t be altered...

That night, Zhang Hao experienced what a super-fast first-round progression meant.

There were 3 games broadcasted tonight: the Bulls and Heat in Game 3, the SuperSonics and Phoenix Suns in Game 3, and the New York Knicks and Cavaliers in Game 3. freeweɓnovel.cøm

The Bulls came to Miami and once again achieved a resounding victory over the Heat, 112-91, winning each of the three games by at least 20 points, delivering the most brutal sweep in over 20 years. The last time a series was swept with each game won by over 20 points was in 1973, and such an exaggerated scenario had never occurred in the modern basketball era.

The outcome of the series was something Zhang Hao could predict after the first game, but he didn’t expect the Heat to be this pitiful.

What truly disappointed Zhang Hao were the Cavaliers. Clearly, their strength was about the same as the Knicks, and they were the team that did the best at restricting opponent scores in the regular season. The first two games were closely contested with the Knicks, but after falling behind 0-2, the Cavaliers’ mindset exploded. In Game 3 at their home court, the anxious Cavaliers allowed the Knicks to score a staggering 108 points, which was the highest single-game postseason points they allowed since the 1992 Eastern Conference Finals Game 5!

Even the 1993 back-to-back defending champion Bulls couldn’t score so many points in one game against the Cavaliers; the last time was in the 1992 Eastern Conference Finals Game 7 when the Bulls crushed the Cavaliers with a score of 112-89.

"The defensive battles between the Cavaliers and Bulls are always worth watching; what a pity..."

The Heat and Cavaliers were swept, and tonight, there was another team that was directly knocked out, the Phoenix Suns.

Payton scored 15 points, dished out 7 assists, and grabbed 6 steals; Kemp had 30 points and 12 rebounds; Schramm had 11 points, 13 rebounds, and 10 assists. With the trio’s outstanding performance, the SuperSonics easily defeated the Suns 101-87. Barkley gave it his all in this game, shooting 13 out of 27 and making 11 out of 13 free throws, racking up 37 points and 16 rebounds, 7 of which were offensive rebounds.

However, the Suns were no longer the Finals team of the past, and trailing 0-3, they were swept out by the SuperSonics!