Basketball: Starting from the Rodman template

Chapter 203: Rapidly gaining momentum, then failing again
The Wizards also have plans for the Heat.

Use Larry Hughes to defend Wade on the outside, so that Arenas can devote himself to his personal offense.

Larry Hughes averaged 22 points, 6.7 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game this season, which is a new high in his career.

But that's not the most important thing. His most important statistic is his average steals per game, which is as high as 2.9!
He is the league's "steals leader" this season.

Many media think it is unfair not to see his name on this year's "All Defensive Team".

Others' steals do not mean that the defense is good, but Larry Hughes' steals can play this role, because many of his steals are frontal steals in close situations. His strong defense is what he has shown to the outside world this season. Maximum impression.

The only concern or dissatisfaction the Washington media has with him is:

This year is his contract year, and after this season he will sign the next contract.

After experiencing the failure of Jordan's comeback, the owner of the Wizards has no intention of investing in building a team in the past two years.

In addition, they believe that Larry Hughes and Arenas will bring a better future to the Wizards.

In fact, they did it, reaching the second round of the playoffs. This is the first time since the 21st century!
Woody succeeded in jumping the ball and gave the ball to Alston.

The "Street Ball King" took the ball through the backcourt, and the Heat handed Wade their first attack tonight.

The first time Wade got the ball, Hughes took the initiative to provide sufficient confrontation.

Wade's confrontation this season is also his highlight, so he did not rush to take the ball, but wanted to use the "triple threat" to force Hughes to actively give up an offensive position. Who knew that Hughes's strength and confrontation were compared to him? Not weak at all.

Instead, he stumbled, took a step back, and was forced to drop the ball.

Larry Hughes was unforgiving, and Wade was a little confused. Fortunately, Gerald Wallace came over to provide him with a pick-and-roll, and Wade was able to turn the corner.Rushed to the basket and stuffed the ball into Woody's hands.

Woody raised his hand and dunked.

Jeffries was 2 meters tall, but the confrontation was too much. Woody easily pushed him away and completed a one-handed chop without even moving his body.

The powerful move filled the scene with cheers.

When it was the Wizards' turn to attack, Arenas faced Alston. His first explosive step was to rush toward the free throw line, then stop for a jump shot, and the ball fell steadily into the basket.

easy!

Alston has no shame to look at Stan Van Gundy. He is sure that the latter is looking at him with gritted teeth.

These two goals also became the basic situation twice in the next 5 minutes.

The Wizards, who many media thought could definitely win, unexpectedly made the Heat feel troublesome.

The reason is that Wade will be locked up by Larry Hughes. On the offensive end of the Wizards, no matter who of the three outsiders faces Alston, they can complete the offense very well without any effort at all.

This forced Woody and Gerald Wallace to make timely saves.

But the Wizards' three perimeter players, including Jamison, averaged 2.3 assists per game...

They are not people who cannot pass the ball!

After Woody goes out, all Shaquille O'Neal can do is make the inside space crowded, and there is no hope at all in terms of movement and footwork.

Haywood and Jeffries completed the attack one after another.

After the first quarter, the Heat were 26 point behind 27-1!
The Wizards look strong!

The first team to change formations was actually the Heat. This was something that no one expected before the game started.

Jones was put on the main lineup.

Stan Van Gundy really couldn't stand Alston's shoddy defense.

In fact, the score is tight, and the Wizards have no good way to limit the Heat's scoring. If they continue to play, no one knows what the result will be.

The Wizards were just better than everyone expected, not that they actually performed as well as suppressed the Heat. They were still far from that level.

Stan Van Gundy was not as anxious as he seemed. He changed formations so quickly, just wanting to quickly find some ways to limit the Wizards.

This is the first game of the series, and there are at least three more games to come. He wants to play more relaxedly in the next few games.

It would definitely be a very lucky thing for the Heat to advance to the next round quickly.

As far as the Pistons and Pacers are fighting each other, one thing is certain, they will never be able to easily decide the winner.

A more likely scenario is:

The two teams played 7 games again!
If the series can be ended earlier than them, then no matter who of the two teams eliminates their opponents and reaches the Eastern Conference Finals, they will drag their exhausted bodies and continue to play in the Eastern Conference Finals without any chance to breathe.

Under such circumstances, the Heat are more certain to win against their opponents!
The playoffs are all about taking advantage of the "right time and place". Any aspect may become the key to victory. This is what makes the playoffs exciting.

After Jones came up, the height came up immediately.

Although he no longer has the defensive ability of his peak period, he will not be beaten when facing off like Alston. This can improve the quality of Woody and Gerald Wallace's defensive defense.

In this way, it will be difficult for them to pass the ball inside easily.

The Wizards' tactics are actually very simple, because Larry Hughes's shooting is not very stable, and Jamison is not a very good scorer without the ball. No matter who has the ball among their three outsiders, the other two do the most. The most important thing is to cut and run.

The style of play is mainly about sudden points.

As the Heat's defense becomes timely, they have only one way to solve the problem, and that is to solve the problem with the star's personal ability. This is also a way, but playing like this will undoubtedly consume the star's physical energy. huge.

Many "super giants" led by a single core have no results in the playoffs, and they are often dragged down like this!

No matter how physically fit a person is, it is impossible for him to do 7 games alone.

The Heat gradually curbed the Wizards' momentum. Although the opponent was still clinging to the score, at the end of the half, they only led the Wizards by 4 points.

But the consumption of the main players on both sides is different.

As the game entered the fourth quarter, this was very obvious. In the critical decisive stage, Woody and Shaquille O'Neal stepped forward one after another and used strong shots under the basket to help the team continue to score.

On the other hand, the Wizards' three perimeter players, who played very stably in front, missed shots one after another.

The point difference was also completely widened at this time, and at the end of the game, the Heat easily defeated the Wizards 101-90, with a score difference of 11 points.

The Wizards' performance here is actually very good:

阿里纳斯拿到了25分4篮板5助攻；拉里-休斯拿到了21分5篮板3助攻3抢断；安托万-贾米森也有跟他常规赛时期差不多的18分进账。三个人都发挥出了自己的实力，按说这样的比赛，在以往奇才队基本都可以拿下，但今晚却输了。

The reason is that the physical fitness of these three people is completely insufficient by the fourth quarter.

The Wizards are relying on their isolation play more than ever.

No matter what time, star singles are the most energy-consuming way.

Especially in the playoffs, in order to prevent the super giant from taking over the game at critical moments, many teams force him to play in singles and let him take away all the points he deserves in the early part of the game.

In the more critical fourth quarter, he did not have the physical ability to do more things.

The Heat implemented this defensive concept very well tonight and achieved very good results.

After Alston came off the court, the Heat's entire space was actually relatively narrow. Neither Wade nor Gerald Wallace had a very good ability to catch the ball and shoot three-pointers.

The Wizards head coach only noticed this when he opened the data sheet after the game.

Previously, he focused too much on how to improve the Wizards' more offensive changes.So much so that he never thought about using defense to restrict the Heat and let them fall into the star's singles.

However, it’s not too late to find out now.

The score is now 1-0, and the series has just begun. In the second game, they can definitely do this.

When Alston went off the court and Caron Butler left, the Heat's UCLA strategy of using Wade as the outside ball-handler no longer existed to a certain extent.

Moreover, Larry Hughes' defense against Wade was also very effective. Of the three steals in the first game, two of them were Wade steals.

Wade made him very uncomfortable, and at one point he missed three consecutive singles.

The Wizards head coach started from this situation and arranged the defensive tactics for the second game.

Trying to get the Heat into singles games with stars...

The plan was still very successful...

When Wade is restricted by Larry Hughes, the ball carrier becomes Woody.

But Woody doesn't have very good organizational skills. Even though he averages so many assists per game, these assists come very easily. He rushes in to find Shaq and lets him score, or he passes the ball out to Wade and Gerrard - Wallace's air cuts can complete the follow-up.

In short, when he holds the ball outside the three-point line, to a certain extent, it is equivalent to letting him play alone.

Stan Van Gundy also understood the Wizards head coach's thoughts at this time. He immediately called a timeout and decided to take advantage of the situation:

Since you want us to fall into singles, let's go singles!

The Wizards' perimeter defense is very good, especially Larry Hughes.

But Wade is not the only one on the Heat's perimeter who can hold the ball and play in isolation.

Of course, he was not referring to Woody pulling outside the three-point line for a single.

But...

Gerald Wallace!
He also has the ability to play in singles with the ball!
As a result, the Wizards' perimeter defense is not enough.

Arenas and Jamison, there is always one person who has to face the other two.

Let's not talk about Arenas' defense. At this moment, his team's reputation is at its strongest. Even if he is not good at defense, he will not be a point of breakthrough.

But Jamison is a typical "offensive strong and defensive weak", a typical player who can score as many points as he can give away.

Stan Van Gundy's arrangement is nothing more than letting Woody, Wade and Wallace hold the ball on the outside, and whoever is facing Jamison will be singled out.

The effect is outstanding!
Jamison became a visible hole in the Wizards' defense.

At the end of the first half, the Heat also led 50 to 42 by 8 points.

The Wizards did not open up the offensive end today and only scored 42 points at halftime. The main reason was that Larry Hughes focused more on the defensive end.

However, the Wizards head coach can accept this result, because the Heat only scored 50 points at halftime!

He is now waiting for Heat players to have physical problems.

But he soon discovered something was wrong...

When 5 of the 4 players on a team can hold the ball in singles, including the other one who also has a certain ability to hold the ball...

It is difficult for you to see the opponent's lack of physical fitness due to singles.

In fact, the Wizards' three offensive points with the ball should not have all physical problems.But the problem is that Larry Hughes is too tired. He has to expend energy on the defensive end, and he has to help hold the fire on the offensive end.

The Heat's defense itself is very capable of suppressing firepower, and the defensive capabilities of Woody and Gerald Wallace are really outstanding.

Jamison can't fight hard again. At this time, Arenas is the target of all the trouble. It's a wonder he's not tired!

The Heat are different. Apart from anything else, at critical moments, they have two points they can trust, one is Woody and the other is Shaq. They can take turns taking over the game, and there is no need for one person to carry the team. As we move forward and share the pressure, there will naturally be no problems with our physical fitness.

The Wizards once again lost the game 89-105.

This time it was a bit of a defeat.

So when the Wizards players left the field, every one of them had their heads hanging down. By the end of the game, they had fallen into complete passivity.

And they don't think this kind of passivity can be eliminated when they return to their home court.

"But they performed better than the Nets. At least they resisted and remained stalemate for a while." Barkley commented this way.

After all, the Nets didn't even have a stalemate and used the "shark-killing" tactic. The result was a huge defeat in every game.

Stan Van Gundy is getting more and more confident because he found another big advantage that the Heat can win in Game [-].

That is, the Wizards do not have enough blue-collar players on the inside. When Haywood and Jeffries come off the court, the quality of their inside defense will drop. This decline is not only beneficial to Woody and Shaquille O'Neal, but also It is also conducive to breakthroughs from the outside.

The collapse also started at that time.

So in the third game, at the home court of the Wizards, Stan Van Gundy caught the opponent's ferocious inside attack from the beginning.

For the first time in his life, the head coach of the Wizards misses Kwame Brown!

(End of this chapter)