The Rest, Only Noise

Before the 1985-86 preseason began, college basketball broke the news.

College superstar Benjamin Wilson's teammates say he's considering emulating Ralph Sampson and entering the NBA draft after his freshman season.

If he does, he'll be the first player in franchise history to do so.

No one knows why he chose to do so.

The New York Knicks ushered in the first preseason game of the Ewing era against the Seattle SuperSonics.

The two sides point to so far, the Knicks win.

Even if the Knicks won, they still had a lot of troubling issues in the game.

With a high turnover rate, Ewing's immediate combat power is not at the level that fans imagined.

As a result, they really had a 50% preseason win rate.

Ewing averaged 26 minutes per game, scoring 18 points, 7 rebounds, 3 blocks and 4 fouls.

"Not a good sign."

The conjecture of whether Ewing was overestimated first appeared in the mouths of the New York media.

The contradiction within the team is that it does not adapt to Louis' new system.

Louie ignored these voices and insisted on fighting.

There are always doubters about change, and those doubters helped the team win the Ewing Award last season.

Their questioning is weak.

Louie chose the system not just because they had Stockton on the team, but because there were many changes to the system.

John Wooden is known as the greatest coach in North American history, and not just because he coached two of the greatest centers in college basketball history.

The mechanism of college sports results in that the competitiveness of the school is very dependent on enrollment, and in an era when players generally play for four years, the coaching staff can build an offensive system around the ace.

When Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was still called Alcindo, he was known for winning three consecutive championships. The offensive system at the time revolved around Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's low post attack to create offensive opportunities for his teammates. This is the earliest triangle offense.

After Kareem Abdul-Jabbar graduated and entered the NBA, Bill Walton entered.

Walton and Abdul-Jabbar are both centers, but have very different technical characteristics. Walton doesn't have the rim as well as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, but he's better at passing and playing at the high post. Wooden taught students in accordance with their aptitude and modified the team's system, focusing on Walton, who was at the free throw line, so that he was always in an invincible position.

Walton landed above the free throw line, and the other players used mutual screens to cut and run back, making it even more difficult to guard against. After leaving Wooden, Coach Wooden's assistant, Pete Carell, relied on this idea of ​​the center at the top and flourished at Princeton University, eventually forming the Princeton offense.

When a system evolves into two distinct branches under the same coach, it is necessary to seriously speculate on its essence.

What's more, there is a third branch of the system.

Before Walton and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, there had been two consecutive championships, and that team didn't have a great center.

At the time, the aces were Gail Goodrich and Walt Hazzard SG.

Both are guards, and Coach Wooden immediately took the fast-paced dynamic offense as the core of the system, achieved the league's first offensive efficiency, and indirectly led the NBA's offensive revolution. The Boston Celtics absorbed the advanced concepts and played the "Boston fast break" under Havlicek's running, which brought the NBA to the era of fast break for everyone.

If you stand a little sideways, you can blindly think of fast breaks as a precursor to run-and-gun. If so, the system is the grandfather of the three most famous tactical systems in the NBA.

This is why Louis wants to implement the system.

He is not trying to copy the tactics of 20 years ago, but wants his tactical system to have the variety of the system.

If Ewing suddenly becomes the core that can dominate offense and defense in the future, maybe he can use this guy as the peak of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

There is also another possibility. The Knicks will have stars coming in the future. If they don't adapt to the current pick-and-roll system, they can still learn from this ancestor. This is the same source, and it is easy to change if you think about it.

The unrest in the team was basically suppressed by Louis.

His attitude is very clear. If he doesn't know how to play tactics, he just obeys the command. If he doesn't obey the command and complains, then I'm sorry, I'll sit on the bench.

Louie's true temper, after the contact in the training camp, everyone knows.

Just spray him with Ewing's aura, if anyone else dares to oppose him, they will be ripped off for you.

October 26, 1985

The New York Knicks' first game of the new season was against the Philadelphia 76ers.

The 76ers' best days are over, and they're now a paper tiger that draws fans with star power but isn't championship contender.

Both Malone and Dr. J are well-known figures, and they are also representatives of a very fast decline when they get older.

Andrew Toney, who has the top 50 talents, has been hit by an arrow in the knee, but the 76ers team doctor did not seem to notice the seriousness of the problem, so Toney was injured and played in the new season.

Not to mention that they took Sam Bowie with the same pick that should have taken Barkley.

Moreover, Harold Katz, who was one of the richest owners in the NBA a few years ago, is suffering from a financial crisis and is cutting expenses, and the NBA has no concern.

The 76ers are in trouble both at home and abroad.

Thinking of their predicament, Louie suddenly found that their 1987 first-round pick from Philadelphia suddenly became valuable.

Louie laughed. In the early years, the 76ers loved to send strong substitutes for future draft picks to win the lottery. I didn't expect that one day they themselves would fall into the same predicament.

At the beginning of the game, Malone won the ball first with a rapid speed.

Maurice Cheeks had the ball, and Louie thought of something old as he looked at the guard he nearly brought to the Celtics.

The Knicks start with Stockton, Ellis, Campbell, Oakley and Ewing.

In alignment, they are aligned by position.

Like the Celtics era, there is no such thing as dislocation and matchups based on player characteristics.

Early on, Cheeks used his jumper to educate Stockton.

2 to 0

"John, you are too polite, try hard!" Louie shouted.

Stockton held the ball halftime, and he raised his hand and stretched out two fingers.

Ewing and Oakley's eyes widened at the same time.

They actually didn't see what the gesture meant for the first time.

Stockton had to shout: "high35!"

The serial number of a high-level tactic can be ranked as 35, which shows how much pressure is on the Knicks to play inside.

Ewing and Oakley were on the high post at the same time, and they were high on the left like a replacement, setting up a pick-and-roll for Stockton at a forty-five-degree angle on the left.

Nice step screens disintegrate the 76ers defense.

Stockton hits a jumper from outside the paint.

Stockton doesn't like to talk trash. If he has an opinion on his opponent, he can at most give him a "you know it" look.

Cheeks no doubt read Stockton's eyes just now.

That look means: You're nothing special, don't be so arrogant.

At this time, Louie suddenly saw that Ewing was defending Malone as if his brain had short-circuited.

"Patrick, you fucking..."

Dr. J lobs the ball to Malone.

Ma Long raised his hips and tried to push Ewing away, but he didn't expect that the other party would remove the stool and only push it into the air. When he jumped up again, there was already a bad omen in his heart.

Sure enough, behind him, Ewing yelled like a shadow of death and threw his ball out of bounds.

"Patrick gave Moses Malone an unforgettable big hat!" growled Marv Albert, "Ewing's first impression at MSG is so impressive!"

At this time, Ewing turned back and asked Louis, "What did you just say?"

"What, did I talk? It's a fan with a similar voice to me. Don't pay attention to him. Your cap just now was amazing. I'm very optimistic about you!" Louis gave him a thumbs up after saying that. , I just don't know if anyone can capture this picture, and then compare it with Uzumaki Naruto's signature "I have white teeth, you are great" than thumbs to see who is more heartwarming.

Louie excused Ewing, and when he turned back, he threatened the players behind him: "If anyone dares to tell Patrick about my 'mistake' just now, I'll kill him, understand?"

Everyone nodded.

"People are not **** sages!" Louis explained to himself clearly, "Who can be a **** fault!"

Bol trembled: "Can 'fuck' still be used like this?"

(1) If you pay attention to NBA history, you will find that two trends have been led. The fast-break trend, and the trend of the Princeton-style offense built with supporting centers like Walton. The 1970s were the most prolific years for coordinating insiders.