When the Mosaic team's attack time came, Jeremy Lin held the ball through halftime and quickly passed it to James Harden.
Seeing this scene, Wang Zelin understood that Jeremy Lin was as unhappy in Mosaic as he was in his previous life.
The playing styles of Jeremy Lin and Harden are destined to be ball-handling players. The two cannot coexist at all, which requires one to make sacrifices.
Obviously, the one who was first arranged to make sacrifices by the coaching staff was Jeremy Lin, who was on the weaker side.
As soon as Harden came up, he signaled to his teammates to pull away as he did in the previous game: Labor and management wanted to play in isolation.
After leaving the Thunder, Harden was like a wild horse running wild. No one could restrain his scoring instinct. He enjoyed his time in Houston very much.
Harden serves as Mosaic's offensive arrow, and the one who focuses on him is Batum, the Trail Blazers' perimeter striker.
Facing Batumna's long wingspan and fierce eyes, Harden felt a lot of pressure, but it soon turned into motivation.
Although he played as the core of the rotation in the first few years of the Thunder, as the future number one shooting guard in the league, Harden's offensive skills have already been perfected.
I saw him dribbling the ball quickly with his hips, observing the direction of the players on both sides and the changes of the defenders with his eyes. Suddenly he accelerated to the left and forced Batum to retreat. Then he stopped suddenly, stepped back to open up the space, and took a long
Two-point shot.
"Whoosh!"
Compared with the three-point step back, to a certain extent, the two-point step back is actually more unpredictable and difficult to guard against.
Now Harden's trump card is the two-point step back and his extremely explosive body in the second position.
Harden, who was born as the third overall pick in the draft, had even better physical test data as a rookie than his second brother Westbrook. However, due to some reasons in the later period, his playing style became more and more inclined to the floor, which made people ignore his explosive performance.
physical fitness.
"James~~Harden! A beautiful step back for two points. Our new leader quickly responded to the opponent. The Space City will usher in another recovery."
This offense vaguely showed Harden's unsolvable singles ability in the future.
After the Mosaic team scored, the Trail Blazers quickly launched a counterattack.
Lillard once again handed the ball to Wang Zelin who squeezed into the three-second zone, but this time he did not choose to continue to strengthen the inside. Instead, as a transition, he quickly passed the ball to Matthews, who was left empty on the baseline.
Harden on the other side actively defended. Although he didn't block the ball, he still provided some defensive interference.
Sure enough, Matthews had to slightly adjust his posture at the last moment of taking action, and the entire movement became unsmooth.
Not smooth means that the rhythm is chaotic, and the result is a missed shot.
"mine!"
Asik stared at the rebound in the sky, and jumped up with his legs...
A long arm appeared out of the air, grabbed the rebound in front of Asik, and stuffed it back into the basket.
"Sorry, it's mine!"
Wang Zelin looked down at Asik and chuckled.
The 3rd rebound!
"snort!"
The expression of Asik, who was inferior to others, instantly turned gloomy. He grunted and passed Wang Zelin, quickly walked over and picked up the ball.
Two deductions were made just now, and then Wang Zelin's anger subsided a lot and he stopped pestering him.
But when he returned to defense, his surprised eyes were fixed on Harden on the other side.
I really didn’t expect to see Deng, who was still willing to work hard on defense before he was defeated by Kardashian.
What a good child, why did he become like that...
The pace of the game between the two sides was very fast, with the two teams going back and forth, and almost every attack was completed in about 13 or 14 seconds.
There are actually only a few things Wang Zelin has to do on the court: first, to provide a screen for his teammates to catch the ball and transition; second, to defend the basket well; and third, to strengthen his own basket offense when given the opportunity.
When the time reached the middle of the second quarter, the Trail Blazers' advantage had grown like a snowball, and the point difference gradually widened. The two sides were tied at 35:27.
Wang Zelin has played for 16 consecutive minutes without rest. This is the longest sustained game he has played since joining the NBA. His physical energy is consumed very quickly, but it is corresponding and the harvest is quite fruitful.
17 points, 8 rebounds, 2 blocks and 2 fouls. This is the data Wang Zelin handed over in one and a half minutes of this game. They have all caught up with the efficiency of the previous game.
He was in exceptionally good condition today, and his personal desire to perform was also extremely strong.
No one knows why, but people only need to know that Wang Zelin has handed over an excellent transcript, and that is enough.
As for those two fouls?
Come on, it seems too insignificant in front of the previous series of data.
Young people always make mistakes, right? They still have time to change and make progress.
"Wang, you played so well today. At a certain moment, I even vaguely saw the style of the future number one center in the league!"
On the bench, coach Terry patted Wang Zelin on the shoulder, his eyes full of appreciation.
"Hoo! Hoo!" After taking a few deep breaths, Wang Zelin wiped his sweat, raised his head and said, "Thank you for the compliment, sir, but I think I can do better."
"Hahaha, it's a good thing to be motivated, but your physical strength is a little weak. What you have to do now is to trust your teammates. I will let you continue playing time in the third quarter, okay?"
"OK!"
Of course Wang Zelin knew that the coach was doing it for his own good, so he quickly put on his thermal clothes.
After Wang Zelin left the game due to physical problems, the Trail Blazers changed their inside combination to Aldridge and Hickson, who were commonly used last season.
Since most of the offensive rights were in the hands of Wang Zelin and Lillard in the first quarter, Aldridge played very leisurely and is still very physical.
Although there is one missing player, there is still a certain overall strength gap between Mosaic and the Trail Blazers. The lineup created by the team management for Harden may have the strength to enter the playoffs, but it cannot
Go further.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! The game continues, and the Blazers' current offense is mainly completed by the inside and outside guns of Aldridge and Lillard.
Mosaic's inside duo, whether Parsons or Asik, is no match for Aldridge.
In my impression, during Aldridge's peak performance in the playoffs, the background board was a mosaic.
As for Jeremy Lin, he struggled with Lillard on the defensive end, but in the end the difference was too big. Their only advantage was Harden.
No matter what it is, it will become weak if used too much.
When Mosaic's offense relied entirely on Beard alone, his physical strength also declined very quickly, and his efficiency gradually declined.
Now Harden has not encountered the tight defense of Kardashian. He has just arrived in Space City. He is full of beautiful vision and high fighting spirit for the future of himself and the team. He has always yearned to become an idol.
An offensive and defensive superstar like Kobe.
Therefore, Harden must not only attack well in this game, but also be the gatekeeper of perimeter defense in the team's defensive system.
Not only has he not lost the defensive skills he learned when he was the sixth man in the Thunder, but has a tendency to strengthen.
Affected by physical strength after the start of the third quarter, Mosaic's main players played poorly: Harden made 2 of 6, Parsons made 1 of 3, and Jeremy Lin made 0 of 2.
On the other hand, Asik's performance in the paint was acceptable. He scored 6 points with many tip-ins in the paint. Together with the substitutes, he barely scored 19 points.
According to the current rhythm of the NBA game, most teams score around 30 points in a single quarter smoothly, around 25 points are considered normal, below 20 points can be considered poor efficiency, and below 15 points can be considered difficult to score.
The Houston Mosaics are an offensive team, averaging around 267 points per game is their normal level, but they performed so poorly in the third quarter, which shows their low offensive efficiency.