Whether a team is strong or not in the playoffs may have to watch a series to see for fans, and it is impossible to judge one game.

But for professional players, playing a game on the field, there is a comparison before and after, and you can quickly feel the strength and weakness.

Especially for the Clippers players, the last round played the Trail Blazers, and this round played the Spurs, this difference is really big.

According to the Trail Blazers' style of play and intensity, if the Clippers open in the first quarter, then in Stamps, the Trail Blazers will collapse directly.

The first two semi-finals are a prime example of this.

And this game The Clippers opened with a morale boom, and Popovich called a timeout in the opening 10 seconds but failed to stop the Clippers from attacking the wave.

But the Spurs players held on to the court, waiting for the official timeout and getting a respite.

Replaced by Stotts, he must have been unable to help but call a timeout, and then came back from the pause and found that it was useless, and a wave was pierced again, and the difference was stretched to more than 15 points, and the second quarter was done again, 30 points in the half, and the second half paddled back to take a shower.

And this official timeout is honestly more important to the Clippers, and if there is no official timeout, Rivers will also call a timeout.

Because of the Spurs' early packing, Li Liang was very uncomfortable.

The Spurs' early wrapping was very accurate and resolute, that is, at the moment when Li Liang received the ball just after half court, Leonard and Tony Pater immediately rushed forward and forced Li Liang to the middle corner.

At the same time, Danny Green is a dead stick to Chris Paul and does not give Paul a chance to easily receive the ball.

Barnes is completely empty, and the Spurs are just letting Barnes go, whatever you want.

It doesn't matter if you dribble through or shoot three points, if you shoot, it's yours, if you can't shoot...... If you can't shoot the Spurs, you will have to teach the Clippers a lesson.

The battle of wits between the two sides began in the first quarter of the game.

Rivers saw this and made a change at the timeout, replacing Griffin and bringing on Crawford.

In this way, the Clippers have two points of contact on the outside, Crawford and Paul, and at the same time, Li Liang mentioned the position of power forward.

However, in this way, there is another problem, Li Liang is going to face Duncan.

The advantage of this lineup is on offense, and the Clippers must play to their offensive advantage, and then the second lineup will go to Griffin to connect with each other, and a combination of punches can knock the opponent down.

But after the timeout, the double lock of Spurs outside Leonard + Danny Green successfully caused Crawford's turnover.

The Spurs quickly countered, and Leonard received a pass from Parker and scored a layup, and the two sides were tied.

Subsequently, Leonard almost steals Li Liang again on the defensive end, but the referee blew the whistle late and blew Leonard's push foul.

Leonard never argued, gave the ball to the referee, Li Liang was pushed down, and his teammates stepped forward to pull him up.

The Spurs' defense revolves entirely around Li Liang.

Popovich and the Spurs coaching staff must have done a lot of preparatory work and tried everything possible to lock up Li Liang.

Li Liang sent the sideline ball, the Spurs' defense was very tight, Li Liang gave it to Paul, and then slipped to the bottom line to the right corner to receive the ball, and then passed the ball to Jordan Jr. in the middle.

Li Liang was interspersed with running on the court, it can be said that he spared two laps, ran back to the bottom left corner, received a pass from Barnes, made a three-point shot, and hit!

A beautiful three-point shot, in the case of high concentration, Li Liang's hand is well controlled.

The Spurs' tough defense did not make Li Liang back down, he will only rise to the occasion!

In fact, the Spurs players and Popovich are also very distressed, and Li Liang is really difficult to deal with.

You have to say that he has strong personal ability, in terms of singles skills, he is much worse than Kobe Bryant, Maddie or something in the past.

You have to say that his personal ability is poor, scoring explosiveness, three-point shooting ability explosion, so that your mother doesn't know him.

You say he's a system player, he can often use his individual ability to ignore the defense and hammer the opponent.

You say that he is not a system player, Li Liang did use the Clippers' system to help him have a better offensive environment.

So for this player, Popovich really can't figure it out, anyway, all kinds of tricks will greet him.

After that, Parker slipped to the flank and missed a mid-range jumper.

Li Liang won the backcourt rebound and launched a quick counterattack, but the pass was wrong and was cut off by Danny Green.

Danny Green made a long pass to the basket, Leonard wanted to relay in the air, but was intercepted by Li Liangchong!

Want to play flight attendant on my turf? There are no doors.

The offensive and defensive battles between the two sides were already heated in the middle and late stages of the first quarter.

The defensive intensity on both sides was very high, and the shooting percentage began to go down.

Li Liang is still very cautious in his shot selection, and he wants to mobilize the Clippers' offense more through passing.

However, the Spurs' tight defense and efficient rotation made the Clippers' positional battle very difficult.

And the Spurs didn't play well offensively.

Parker's form after the opening was average, and he was the number one engine of the Spurs' offense last season, and his form has slipped too much this season.

After Ginobili's debut, the Spurs' offense has not changed.

Compared with Li Liang's cautious and cautious offense, he completely let go of his hands and feet on the defensive end, constantly interfering with the Spurs' positional offensive coordination.

Before the start of the series, Li Liang's most preparation was not to practice three-point shooting, but to keep watching the Spurs' offensive video clips.

After a two-round series, the Spurs reached a point where they were very fluid and comfortable on the offensive end.

If you want to beat Spurs, you must not ignore the strength of Spurs in attack.

This is the success of Popovich's reform of the Spurs since 2010, a team that has been operating with GDP as the core for more than a decade, from a slow-paced defensive superstar team in the past, to a team that now integrates offense and defense.

As for how strong it is, others may not know very well, but Li Liang knows that it is very strong, no worse than the Clippers with 70 wins.

Of course, any strong team has loopholes and shortcomings, and if you want to beat your opponent, you have to catch the opponent's shortcomings and loopholes.

Li Liang believes that the biggest advantage of the Spurs on the offensive end is their skillful transfer of the ball and tacit passing coordination, and the loophole also lies in their transfer and passing coordination.

The so-called strong must cover its short.

One of the main reasons why the Spurs have the best offensive combination in the league is that they have to rely on this kind of team cooperation.

They didn't need it because they had Duncan.

Now they still have Duncan, but Duncan is 38 years old.

Before the age of 30, Duncan can make offense easy, and the 38-year-old Duncan can only ensure a few attacks at key moments and stability on the defensive end.

If you want to rely on Duncan completely, you definitely can't.

That's why it took the Spurs a few years to build a new system and give Duncan a new style of play and positioning.

And what Li Liang has to do is to try to break their system and destroy their transfer ball.

Of course, this is very difficult, and the defense needs the cooperation of the whole Clippers team, otherwise Li Liang will also be slipped by the Spurs' pass.

Rivers and Mike Brown certainly did the preparation, and Rivers had some arguments with Brown, Lue and others for this.

Rivers believes that the Clippers are the initiative to respond to all changes with the same, so just stick to the second-round style of play.

Of course, Li Liang doesn't think so, Li Liang and even the potential of this Spurs, many people don't see it, so he constantly puts forward opinions with the coaching staff, thinking that it is necessary to respond on the defensive end and strike first.

And Mike Brown thinks that Li Liang is right, and I think the same way.

Therefore, Brown developed a defensive strategy, which is to use the defense to contain the Spurs' passes, and the corresponding Spurs' misplaced offense and low post singles.

It's a risky defensive strategy.

Misplaced singles are the ultimate goal of many offensive tactics in the NBA, and if the Spurs are allowed to attack a lot of misalignment, it is possible to break down the Clippers' defense.

However, Li Liang is confident that he will make up for it to the greatest extent, and believes that the Spurs' current one-man offensive firepower will not collapse the Clippers' defense so easily.

What's more, Li Liang is confident in his offense.

In the first quarter, although the Spurs tightly bit the score, the Clippers still suppressed the Spurs on the court.

When the Spurs continued to rely on foul free throws to chase points, Li Liang hit a three-pointer again to stabilize the situation.

He then made an offensive foul on Leonard on the defensive end.

When Li Liang came off the court in the first quarter, he scored 13 points on 5-of-5 shooting, and added 4 rebounds and 3 assists.

Leonard and Li Liang went off at the same time.

Li Liang didn't forget to say hello to Leonard, "Come on, try to prevent me." ”

Although Li Liang was robbed, he didn't miss a single shot.

Leonard was expressionless, didn't even look at Li Liang, and walked off the court.

But the war between the two has already begun.