With the final minutes of the second quarter remaining, and with both teams ready to put their best players ready to fight their opponents to the death, Shaq was particularly excited at this point, as if he wanted to do a similar feat because I had a successful dunk over the head of Olajuwon.

The first attack of the Rockets chose to attack by the glider at a high angle of about 45 degrees, but I found that the Rockets at this time seemed to have adopted another tactic, Da Meng stood near the free throw line, Barkley moved from the baseline to 45 degrees up for Drexler to make a block, and Drexler used this block to quickly move to the baseline.

Oh my god, this seems to be the Rockets' version of the triangle offense, and I know that because I didn't keep up with the glider Drexler in the first place, he's going to attack our basket directly from the baseline.

At this time, my forward line was blocked by Olajuwon near the free throw line, so I couldn't get to the best defensive area in the first place, and the only one who could stop the glider at this time was Shaq.

Although Shaq's defensive reaction was quite good this time, blocking the glider's offensive path before he entered the box, Olajuwon cut inside along the free throw line and easily received a ground-hitting pass from the glider Drexler to score a dunk.

This is the first time that the Rockets have used this tactic in these two games, and there is no doubt that we are not prepared enough for it at the psychological and tactical level, but in fact, as a team with top players in three positions, the Rockets play a very powerful triangle offense, unlike the Bulls' triangle offense, everything is centered on Jordan, and the Rockets' triangle offense has at least two points with strong ball handling ability and two points with strong offensive initiation.

Despite this, I was able to tell that this was a triangle offensive tactic at the first time, which seems to indicate that my tactical literacy has been greatly improved in another aspect, and I have often watched the video of the Bulls and Jordan games since the beginning of the game, and I am indeed quite familiar with this offensive tactic.

Shaq, who originally wanted to dunk one angrily in front of Olajuwon, instead let Olajuwon dunk one in front of him first, and in the next offensive round, Shaq carried the big dream with his back and waved his arms hard to ask for the ball, Shaq's key position was very solid, and it was impossible for ordinary people to interfere with his key position, and the only thing to pay attention to was the forward steal from other people around him.

However, the way I pass the ball to Shaq is generally fast, and the start is more hidden, trying to pass the ball to Shaq before the other defenders notice, which also allows him to find better offensive opportunities in the first place.

Shaq held the ball with his back and first carried Da Meng twice, Da Meng couldn't bear Shak's huge strength, so he could only take two steps back, but Shaq did not continue to exert his force back, but glanced at his high position with his eyes, Da Meng Olajuwon followed Shak's gaze for a short hesitation time.

At this time, Shaq made his best shark turn, and hit the innermost part of the penalty area with a back turn in the direction of the bottom line, at this time the big dream Olajuwon just reacted, but his speed is really amazing, reaction speed, movement speed, and bounce speed are much stronger than ordinary interior players.

However, he was facing Shaq, who was above him in height, strength and weight, and in the face of absolute strength, the speed of Big Dream was not enough to make up for it, okay, and finally let Shaq get his wish and slam a dunk on the top of Big Dream's head, and the cheers that rang out in the Staples Arena were endless, no less than the cheers that sounded when I dunked successfully.

Shaq is still strong enough, in fact, he can still occupy a certain advantage in the face of the tough dream Olajuwon, his real problem is that he always can't catch the core point when defending Olajuwon, of course, this can't be blamed on Shak, after all, with the all-round skills of Olajuwon and the extremely high basketball IQ, Shaq doesn't know which means the next attack of the big dream will take, so the confrontation between them is more often a mutual explosion, and no one can limit anyone.

And in this case, it is their teammates who decide the direction of the game, of course I will not be the one who drags my feet, but to be honest, the gold content of this game is much higher than the last game at the Toyota Center, first of all, the level of investment and attention of both sides in this game is not comparable to the previous game.

Our Lakers team had a rare tactical drill before the game, not to mention what kind of level the tactical literacy of the entire team was improved all at once, but at least it can be said that many Lakers players finally understood what some of the tactics of the silver fox Harris were all about, of course, as a professional player, many tactics are actually well known, but the chemistry generated by different types of teammates together will be different, and sometimes it is not enough to just rely on the court to find tacit understanding, Special tactical drills are also needed to make the players think more clearly during the game.

As for the Rockets, there are many tactics they used today that are completely different from the last time they played against us, although it is impossible to say which tactics are better, but there is no doubt that the Rockets are trying not to let us figure out their real game routines, these tactical changes fully show that their players themselves have very high tactical literacy, and the three core veterans have been in the league for many years, and the use of various tactics in various situations is also a matter of handy.

Big Dream Olajuwon was forcibly deducted by Shaq but did not show any displeasure, it seems that all this is just a sparse and ordinary thing, it is also a monster like Shak, it is not news for any inside player, even the inside gate Mutombo, who is taller than Shak, has to be ridden by Shak, which is actually normal for Dameng, whose real height is only two meters and eight.

In fact, Shaq can find one or two goals of self-confidence in Da Meng after a game, compared to other inner players, Dameng Olajuwon's defense of Shaq is already very good, not that Shak's shooting rate has declined much, but in the defense of Shak is very good when receiving the ball, so that Shaq can not attack at the first time after receiving the ball many times, with the rapid emergence of follow-up packs, forcing Shaq to make direct mistakes or pass to give up the attack, so Shaq has a strong desire to attack, But it's rare to really find a good attacking opportunity like the one just now.

After all, Shaq's offensive means are limited, and if he is too far away from the basket, he will completely lose his deterrent, and as long as Shaq's range of action is limited to outside the restricted area, it will be basically difficult for him to exert his due power.

The next few offenses the Rockets used their triangle offense tactics again, and their triangle offense was quite diverse, interspersed from the baseline and midline, some by the glider and some by Barkley, the big dream Olajuwon was always the pivot point of the triangle offense, and the other two changed around this pivot core, so that our defense was always constantly disturbed and affected locally.

Fortunately, we didn't have a dumb fire on the offensive end, so that the score between our Lakers and Rockets alternated in the last few minutes, until the whistle blew at halftime, and the score was finally fixed at 55-55.

This score is not low compared to this era, there will be almost 100 points in the whole game, and the defensive intensity of our two sides today is almost at the level of the playoffs, if we meet the Rockets in the division semifinals or finals in the playoffs, it is bound to be a very exciting round of the series.

At halftime, the atmosphere in our Lakers locker room was quite hot, because Shaq and I both managed to separate the big dream Olajuwon in the middle of the game, so everyone kept putting forward their personal opinions on this topic.

"There is no doubt that I think Kobe's dunk is much more gold and shocking, you must know that Da Meng's arms were almost hanging on his face at that time, and he was able to rise a lot to complete such a terrifying dunk at a high level, this is definitely a death dunk, if I were Olajuwon, I would definitely want to retire on the spot."

The person who blows me is none other than Eddie Jones, and his relationship with me seems to be much better now, to be honest, there are not many players in the team who can be considered to have a good relationship with me, relatively speaking, maybe Horry and Eddie Jones are relatively good, and most of the others have a better relationship with Shaq, of course, this is also a normal thing.

"Who said that, his dunk was obviously supported by Da Meng's shoulders with his hands, so he could have the strength to jump twice, otherwise his head would not be able to hit the basket with his own bounce."

That old boy Byron Scott spoke again, he was the guy who had always stood firmly against me, and he was also the guy who had always been a staunch supporter of Shaq, no matter what kind of ridiculous decision Shaq made, he would support it without a brain.

"I don't think there's any value in discussing this, let's focus more on thinking about how to limit the three old hooligans on the other side in the second half, I'm confident that the glider's full-court score is limited to 20 points, how many points did he score in the first half?"

I couldn't help but speak, after all, wasting the entire halftime just because of a good dunk still made me feel a little brainless.

"Well, Glider Drexler has scored 12 points in the first half, are you really confident that he will limit the score to 20 points for the whole game?"

Unexpectedly, the team's starting point guard, Van Exel, was also interested in participating in the discussion at this time, he played in the first half of the game, and of course it is certainly unlikely that he will get more shots and performances next to me and Shaq.

"Do you want to make a bet?"

Shaq smiled and hugged the shoulders of his two teammates, the smile on his face looked extremely hideous, as if some shady trick was being planned in his stomach.

"Shaq, what do you want to bet on?"

I shook my head speechlessly.

"For the sake of fairness, we both set a goal, you limit the glider to 20 points and I go down to score more than 30 points, I have scored 14 points in the first half, so my task in the second half is to score another 16 points, if we achieve our goal we will not be punished, if we don't do it we need to buy dinner for the whole team for a week, of course if we both don't finish then you buy a week's drinks, I buy a week's hamburger, how about it?"

I shook my head slightly, thinking that Shaq couldn't live without food all day long, and even the punishment for failure was just to buy food.

"I think it's too inconsistent with your team's identity to buy food for the whole team, so if I fail, I'll buy dinner for the whole team for a week, and if you fail, you have to go to the stadium to practice two hours in advance for a week's games, my punishment is not too much, right?"

Shaq's face turned green when he heard this, but it seemed that in the blink of an eye his face had returned to his normal state, and perhaps he felt that he could not lose at all.

"Okay, I'll make this bet with you, and see how I make the big dream cry in the second half."

The other Lakers players around him also coaxed, as if Big Dream had been trampled under Shaq's feet and rubbed at will.

During the half-time break, head coach Silver Fox Harris didn't know where to go, but after a few simple words, he walked out of the locker room with the assistant coach, and he was not back in the dugout until the start of the second half.

After the start of the second half, Shaq really became more aggressive, but the Rockets quickly made some personnel adjustments for him, from the original big dream to defend him to Barkley to defend him, and then the big dream to help defend.

In this way, Shaq is actually not easy to attack directly, because Barkley's weight and strength are stronger than Da Meng, so Da Meng can't bear Shaq, but Barkley can resist a little, but Barkley's height and arm span are too far behind Shaq, and it is definitely impossible to defend Shaq completely by himself, and Da Meng's co-defense is very important at this time.

If Da Meng is allowed to fight Shaq head-on, Da Meng's footwork speed and the advantages of block timing will not be able to be brought into play, but when Da Meng appears as an assistant defender, he can fully exert his advantages in speed and co-defense, when Shaq finally rushed into the penalty area with Barkley hand-to-hand combat, a big dream suddenly appeared behind or on the side to make up for the defense, which can make Shaq very uncomfortable, and it is difficult for him to pass the ball out of the penalty area too deep, either being covered or making a mistake, Even forcing a shot to hit would have consumed a lot of energy, which would have made it even more difficult for him to attack in the second half.

Therefore, the defensive tactics of the Rockets can be described as not clever, so Shaq's power has been greatly weakened, and I don't know why they didn't adopt such a tactic in the first half, maybe it is also because Shaq's physical fitness has decreased in the second half, so it will be better to use Barkley to consume Shaq.

However, Shaq is really fierce, even if the Rockets adopted such tactics against him to defend him, he still relied on his inhuman horror power to score two goals, and also caused an additional Barkley foul.

Of course, although Shaq has a big advantage on the court, he is already a little out of breath when he makes free throws, and his weight is so large that he will definitely overdraw his physical strength in advance to attack such a large movement in a short period of time.

In turn, the Rockets are still using their own version of the triangle offense on the offensive end, and the head coach of the Rockets really has two brushes, and can always arrange the tactics very flexibly according to the different situations on the field, in fact, this itself is also a characteristic of the triangle offense, that is, it is not easy for the defender to find the timing of this offense, because the triangle offense has many different change modes, plus different triangle offenses can directly be converted through the running position on the court. So a lot of times the Rockets can play two or even three consecutive triangle attacks with one attack, which is a really big test for our defense.

And the key is that their three core players are all all-round players who can shoot and dribble, no matter how our defense adjusts their defensive strategy, they can always quickly find new tactical changes to adapt, so as to ensure that their offensive routines will not be completely cracked by us.

After all, in the basketball game, the offensive side is always active, and the defensive side is very passive, in order to achieve perfect defense, not only do you have to do a good job, but also need the opponent to cooperate with you, of course, although it sounds like nonsense, but in fact it is really like this.

Because there is no way to limit the Rockets' triangle offense, the glider scored 6 points directly after the start of the second half, and his total score has come to 18 points, seeing that the goal I set is about to fail, but I have done everything I can when defending him, but the terrible thing is that the glider in the second half seems to have found its touch, and several difficult backward shots against my closed eyes have scored, this kind of ball reminds me of Michael Jordan, Will I experience this kind of uncontrollable despair again when facing him?

And how long does it take me to grow up and become a guy with no solution to the back-up shot.

Although I have a good individual singles ability, my shooting is not very consistent, especially when I shoot accurately after dribbling, and I feel quite desperate when I am iron.

Either way, I'm going to have to find a way to curb the glider Drexler's continued scoring, and if he gets two more points I'll be considered a failure, and God knows how I would have made such a bet with Shaq at halftime, as if every time I bet with him, it doesn't end too well, and next time it seems like I'll have to think about it carefully, even if it's just a week's worth of dinner for my teammates, it's still a bit of a bad face.

Of course, it was actually very difficult for Shaq to complete his bet, although he had already scored a few points after the start of the second half, but every point was obtained by a huge physical exertion, and there is still a long time to go in the next game, and I doubt how much energy he will have left after the fourth quarter.

So now the situation has become that Shaq is trying to attack, and I am trying to defend, but I don't put so much energy into the offensive end, the ball is basically handed over to Shaq and Van Exel, and I myself do my best on the defensive end, and Shaq has become a lot more paddling on the defensive end than before, he is reluctant to go to many balls that should have been made up by him to help defend and defend, and even many rebounds that he can easily win are not very active in scrambling.

It suddenly dawned on me that such a bet seemed to lead us as a whole into a mistake where Shaq and I were desperately trying to complete the bet without considering the interests of the entire team.

Of course, I knew this but I couldn't make a change, because the strong desire to win still instigated me to continue doing it, but the score on the basketball court was the most telling thing, and soon the Rockets played a 15-8 mini-surge, forcing Lakers head coach Silver Fox Harris to call a timeout.

In fact, Harris of the Silver Fox is not very clear about the bet between me and Shaq in the middle of the field, but he can see our performance on the court very clearly, and he clearly criticizes me and Shaq for not attacking and not defending the behavior is quite bad, and for a player like us who can contribute on both ends of the pitch, we should not focus on just one point.

Whether it's on the offensive end or on the defensive end, our Lakers players need to put in the same effort and play more like a single team, not in silos.

Shaq and I both lowered our heads, for fear that the Silver Fox Harris would see something from our expressions, and the other Lakers players were holding back their laughter, neither the Silver Fox Harris nor Shaq seemed to be a target to mess with.

After returning to the court again, I decided to focus on the team, anyway, there is only two points and there should be no way to do it, it is better to play my strength on the offensive end, as for whether Shaq can score 30 points after I help him attract the defense, it is all up to him.

The first offense after coming back, I asked Shaq to come up and do a high block for me, but this guy only thought about dismantling, and when he blocked, he did so-so, so that he didn't completely block the defender, where is the top defensive player like Da Meng so easy to fool, one person saw through all the tactical intentions of Shaq and me, and blocked our offensive line.

After the first tactical failure I continued to look for new attacking opportunities on the outside, Van Exel went to the centre circle to ask for the ball, I saw that there were no good chances and gave him the ball first, and then I was ready to cut inside and look for opportunities.

But Van Exel, who didn't know what he was thinking, took my pass and threw a long-range three-pointer straight to the opposing defender near the center circle.

At first, I thought that he dared to throw like this, he must have practiced and had the confidence to be able to throw, but after throwing it, I knew that the ball was a cheat, and sure enough, the basketball did not fly to the basket but flew directly into the hands of Olajuwon, which is a three-no-stick shot with insufficient strength.

I thought it was not good to see Olajuwon get the ball, at this time it was too late for us to retreat, it turned out that when I cut inside, the glider Drexler did not follow me, but made a substitution defense with the outside, at this time Drexler rushed to our basket first.

And our Lakers replaced him with Robert Horry, who is not at the same level in terms of speed.

As you can imagine, a hasty shot led to a great counterattack for the Rockets, and a pass that ran through the court directly assisted the glider to complete the fast break, and he flew lightly over the Staples court, but this wonderful dunk made the whole Staples fall into silence.

I didn't expect the first attack after the timeout to end like this, and I shook my head helplessly.

Looking back, the game has to go on, and it can be seen that the mentality of the Lakers teammates on the court has changed a little, and they no longer like to run and play according to tactics as they did in the first half, and it seems that after a 15-minute break in one half, the results of those training tactics before the game have disappeared.

Of course, I can't ask too much of them, and in the end, I have to put in a lot of effort to win the game, and since my teammates are not very good anymore, I have to step up and score myself.

Glider Drexler still defended me from shooting as before, moderately letting me break through with a weak side hand, and I decisively continued to attack through the blocking and dismantling with Shaq after seeing his defensive intentions, this time Shaq's blocking and dismantling finally hung people up completely, only he completely blocked the defender, I was able to find some opportunities to play under the Rockets' tight defensive system, otherwise I would have to fight alone.

Glider Drexler's defense of me is now going around the back, if Shaq blocks and dismantles it, he will directly release my three points, but it will strictly prevent my breakthrough and ball space, and Shaq's chance to go down is actually basically blocked by the big dream Olajuwon, the most critical point is that if there is no particularly good passing opportunity, I don't dare to pass the ball directly to Shak, after all, the athleticism and reaction speed of the big dream and glider are very good, and it is easy to intercept the ball directly from the air, In this way, if you are beaten fast and counterattacked like just now, it will especially hurt the morale of the team.

At this point, the momentum of both sides on the court is already in the ascendancy of the Rockets, and I need to be more careful with my passes.

In the midst of the lightning, my nerves gave me an order to shoot a three-pointer using the space the glider had given me.

If you want to say that my three-point shot is not very accurate, as long as you dare to let me open then I have to shoot, even if I can't shoot, it's fine, if I don't shoot, it will only make the Rockets shrink the defense smaller and smaller, and it will be more and more difficult for Shaq and I to get the opportunity to hit the inside.

It was a split second or two, and Shaq completely blocked Big Dream and the glider behind me, and I made a decisive three-pointer, and the basketball made a wonderful arc in the air and finally entered the basket.

My three-pointer came in a very timely manner, because the Lakers hadn't made a three-pointer for a long time, and even the scoring had been a long time, and the appearance of this three-pointer not only brought a little improvement to the situation on the court, but also dealt a hard blow to the Rockets' current defensive strategy.

What they mean now is to stick to the inside anyway, wrap Shaq, and break through with strong pressure, but they will leave a certain amount of room for outside singles players to shoot, as long as the outside singles players are not strong enough to break through the Rockets' single players to score, then their Rockets' defensive center of gravity can shrink smaller and smaller until it completely destroys our offensive confidence.

Drexler saw that I had made a three-point shot, and wanted to chase after me to launch a three-point raid while our Lakers defenders were not on a firm footing, but his idea had already been seen through by me, and in the process of returning to the defense, I did not retreat directly to the Lakers' three-point line, but followed the footsteps of the glider to retreat to the border, and when he ran near the three-point line, I rushed from the side.

At this time, the glider was ready to shoot a three-pointer, and I knew that I had to be accurate and ruthless before he realized where I was, and I jumped from behind him and fanned the ball directly when his arm was still in the ascending stage.

The glider was immediately slapped to the ground by me, but the referee did not blow the whistle, and I immediately picked up the ball and rushed towards the Rockets' basket as fast as I could.

Hand up and down, a handsome one-handed slam dunk, two points easy to hand, then I have cut 15 points at this time, the performance can only be regarded as decent, mainly even if I put a lot of energy into the defensive end, but still let the glider cut as many as 18 points, fortunately I defended this ball, and the agreement with Shaq still has some theoretical possibilities to complete.

Shaq was also dancing happily on the sidelines, this guy is very good at guiding the emotions of the fans and spectators, as long as he yells loudly, the fans in the Staples Arena will involuntarily start to shout higher and higher, and directly cover the other broadcast voices in the stadium before it is over.

Of course, for us in the home team, of course, the more enthusiastic the fans at home, the stronger our combat effectiveness, just after these two goals, my self-confidence has gradually risen, I feel that my hand has been like a wild horse out of control, out of control, simply let go of their hands and feet to enter the offensive state.

As the saying goes, offense is the best defense, and if you want to keep Drexler from having more energy to devote to offense, the best way is to put enough pressure on him on the offensive end to expend a lot of energy to defend you, so that when he goes to attack, he won't have as much energy.

After all, my speed and fitness are at an advantage, and the more I get to the end of the race, the more obvious the physical advantage I have, and it is only good for me to speed up the pace of the race at this time.

But when I scored two more points in a row, the head coach of the Rockets called a timeout.

I let out a long breath and took the energy drink from my teammates on the bench, and drank most of the bottle in one go, but Shaq looked at me with a helpless look.

It was supposed to be the second half when he was supposed to be in the thick of Shaq, and I should have thought more about contributing on the defensive end, and now I'm on a nine-point streak, while Shaq hasn't scored in a long time, and the only time he scored in the last few minutes was a free throw from a foul.

I took a few deep breaths to get my breathing back in, thinking that what I knew about Silver Fox Harris was going to keep me on the bench for a while and then wait until after the fourth quarter to get me on the court.

Sure enough, after this timeout, Shaq and I were substituted, and Eddie Jones led a group of substitutes back on the court, in fact, our main players didn't play for long in the third quarter, but the physical consumption in these few minutes was already a lot.

After the timeout, the Rockets did not replace the main players, and at this point, our Lakers seem to have temporarily taken the initiative, after all, if their main team has been playing the rest of the third quarter, then the physical recovery of their core players after the fourth quarter is a big problem, if Eddie Jones can withstand the crazy counterattack of the opposite side in the next few minutes, we will be able to gain a big advantage if we play again in the fourth quarter, But if he can't withstand this wave of offensive frenzy from the Rockets, it is very likely that our main players will need to return to the court early, and not only will they not win much rest, but they will also have to face a double disadvantage in momentum and points.

At this time, there are about four minutes left before the end of the third quarter, and Eddie Jones needs to stabilize the rhythm of the game on the court, but not let the pace of the game be too slow.

Sure enough, the worrying thing happened, Eddie Jones soon fell into the quagmire of individual singles after being besieged by the old and spicy Rockets Big Three, his individual singles ability can't be compared with me after all, the last game in the Rockets' home Toyota Center, I led the bench to fight against some of the Rockets' main players for a long time, and once took the lead in the situation on the court.

Shaq seemed quite calm at this time, without any emotional fluctuations because the Lakers had fallen into passivity on the court, and I don't know if he was thinking about how many points he needed to score in the fourth quarter to reach the goal of 30 points.

Knowing that individual singles can't save the team, Eddie Jones can only play team basketball with some other Lakers bench players, the so-called team basketball is to pass the ball a few more times, run a few more times, and try to shoot at a better opportunity.

At the beginning, there was still no way to score many points, but it did reduce the team's turnovers, slow down the pace of the game, and consume as much energy as possible from the Rockets' players on the court, and every minute they held on was a major victory.

The Rockets, who are eager to score quickly in a short period of time, are gradually a little out of breath, and they thought at first that our Lakers bench players still have no tactical concept like the last game, so they chose to bet on a wave of main players when we went to the bench, the purpose is to take advantage of these few minutes to overtake the backward score, and at the same time lay a certain lead.

However, the margin is shrinking, but it is not so easy to say that it is not so easy to lay the lead, and Eddie Jones can smoothly drag out the rest of the third quarter as long as he stabilizes the rhythm on both offensive and defensive ends.

Seeing this, the Rockets decisively changed their tactics, and when there were less than two minutes before the end of the third quarter, the Rockets players directly used the half-court tight defense, which is a very physically demanding tactic, and several of them have already played the third quarter of the game.

However, it really relied on the last energy of these old guys, and suddenly shocked these substitutes of our Lakers team from the momentum, and the sudden increase in defensive intensity made them suddenly chaotic because of their lack of personal ability and game experience.

Even Eddie Jones didn't slow down all of a sudden, and there were a lot of low-level mistakes with several other Lakers bench players, which caused the already stable situation to face the possibility of collapse in an instant.

Within a minute, the Rockets played a 7-0 counterattack wave and even regained the score by one point.

This sudden situation also made the Silver Fox Harris have to call another timeout in the last minute, and if the momentum of the Rockets is constantly interrupted at this time, it is difficult to say how many points can be lost in this last minute.

I took a long breath, what had happened in that minute was so fast, those three old Rockets guys were really terrifying, like holding a remote control in their hands, just pressing the whole team to burst out with a lot of energy, able to destroy any opponent who underestimated them.

So we really shouldn't underestimate them, as Olajuwon said before: never underestimate the heart of a champion.