At the same time that the New York Knicks officially entered the Finals, the Western Conference Finals also reached the fifth game, and the Thunder currently led the opponent by a score of 3-1, as long as they won one game, then they could reach the Finals!

This is the first time in their history, and it is also the first time that the Thunder team's "three less" have reached the finals!

For this team, their pendulum for several years finally came to fruition! After three years of drafting, and then two years of training, they finally returned to the stage of the finals!

For a team that is in the process of rebuilding, that's a lot of speed!

Just look at the Nets and the previous Knicks team, how difficult it is to rebuild, not every team is like the Los Angeles Lakers, and they can successfully complete the rebuilding through grabbing people in every rebuilding stage!

Speaking of the Lakers' rebuilding is indeed domineering, at the beginning, it was by getting the "Sky Hook" Abdul-Jabbar to quickly complete the reconstruction, after that, the Lakers managed to complete a reconstruction, if it wasn't for the "Magic" accident, their road to glory could have gone a little longer, but after that, they signed O'Neal, completed the rebuild again, and directly won 3 consecutive championships.

Then they got Pau Gasol from the Grizzlies, and the addition of the latter gave the team another championship!

Of course, Kobe Bryant, the team's boss at the time, was traded to the Hornets with their discernment!

But even so, their knotted superstars are really not few, Abdul-Jabbar, O'Neal and Gasol, "three" except for the last Gasol, whose strength may not be so high, the other two were either the first or the top three in the league at that time, and these two guys alone gave the Lakers more championships than one hand!

The fruits of this robbery are really rich enough!

The Thunder team has also become a benchmark in the industry because of the draft and training in recent years, and it has also pointed the right path for small city teams to succeed.

And for Thunder fans, there is only one thing they are thinking about now, and that is to hurry up to the finals and achieve a breakthrough for the Thunder team to hit the finals to zero!

They also believe that the Thunder will definitely be able to eliminate the Grizzlies in the next game!

"We're so much better than our opponents, so I believe we can definitely win, there's no doubt about that, and I believe that the Thunder won't let me down!"

"It's finally time to make it to the finals! I didn't expect us to actually reach the finals, maybe we can still win the championship! ”

"The Grizzlies rely on the inside twin towers, but we are not weak on the inside, so I believe that we will easily knock out the opponent in Game 5! Then enter the finals and eliminate the Knicks as well! ”

……

Thunder fans are very confident, of course, no wonder they are so confident, the fifth game is the home of the Thunder, and the Grizzlies have not won on the home court of the Thunder!

Based on this alone, they also believe that the Thunder will definitely be able to eliminate the Grizzlies!

"You've won three of them, I wonder if you think you'll be able to get the final win for today's fight?"

Kevin Durant was also asked before the game about his determination to win today.

Du Xiaoshuai faced the camera, didn't think much about it, and said directly: "I believe we can do it, because we have such strength, we will eliminate the Grizzlies, although they are good opponents, but for us, we have only one goal, that is, to impact the finals and get the finals!" Now that the opponent has appeared, all we have to do is finish what we are doing as soon as possible! ”

Kevin Durant didn't say much, but between the lines it was revealed, "My mind is no longer on the Grizzlies, I'm already thinking about how to beat the Knicks!" ”

Of course, I don't blame Kevin Durant for having such a mind, after all, it is the first time in his career that he reaches the Finals is just around the corner, and everyone will be a little excited, including Kevin Durant, he is the same, his desire to enter the Finals is no one can understand, because his goal has been to enter the Finals twice in a row, and he has won two championships, if he does not enter the Finals again, he will feel that he has been left behind!

For Kevin Durant, this is something he will never allow!

And now he can finally enter the finals, which in his opinion, is a solid step for him to take a solid step on the road to chasing Yi Jianlian, which can give him more confidence and make him full of motivation to catch up with Yi Jianlian!

That's why he's so excited!

Because he can finally prove himself in the finals like Yi Jianlian!

In short, he has taken another step forward this year, which is very important!

It's even more important than he won the regular season MVP or other things, because the height of the team's final standing can intuitively reflect the distance between him and Yi Jianlian!

If he can stand on the final stage of the finals, then he will feel that there is hope for catching up with Yi Jianlian!

On the contrary, if he can't enter the finals, Yi Jianlian may win 3 consecutive championships!

is also a player from the class of '07, which will undoubtedly cause a very big shake to his self-confidence, which is not the result he wants to see.

Anyway, in a word, if he can enter the finals, that is the most exciting thing!

……

The day of the game came quickly, and the Oklahoma City Thunder sat at home at the Chesapeake Energy Center to welcome the fifth challenge of the Memphis Grizzlies, this game was a game that the Thunder team wanted to win very much, but in the end, relying on Mike Conley's excellent play, the Bears won this key battle with a score of 99:93, and the overall score was back to 3-2!

On the Thunder side, Kevin Durant scored a game-high 36 with 11 rebounds, as well as 9 assists, but it can be seen that he really wants to win! In addition, there is Sefrosa who performed well and scored 19 points on 6 shots and 9 shots, this guy is just a blue-collar player, he has been serving as the team's outside defense, doing dirty work, and he can have such a scoring performance, which can be said to exceed expectations, to put it bluntly, he has played in the four Western Conference Finals, the highest score is only 9 points, and this game can get 19 points, which is completely beyond the expected performance, it stands to reason that this game has such a miracle soldier does not appear, it should be able to win, But the end result was a loss!

Of course, the reason is also very simple, except for these two guys, the other players of the Thunder team are all out of order!

Center Sergi Ibaka contributed only 11 points and 5 rebounds, and James Harden, who had performed very well in the first four games, had a poor performance of only 6 points, and 4 of them were scored by free throws, except for 4 free throws, he never scored again!

Speaking of which, this season's team's best sixth man award was finally awarded to James Harden, but this kind of performance is obviously not enough to convince the public, because the team's sixth man should be a substantial help to the whole team in the team's bench rotation stage, rather than James Harden barely scoring 6 points, this sluggish performance has also directly harmed the entire team.

It can also be seen from the competition!

As soon as the first quarter came up, the two sides played their respective strengths, the Thunder continued to look for opportunities to fire from a distance through blocking and pick-and-roll, and the Grizzlies continued to use the inside advantage to enter the low post hand-to-hand combat, and the two sides were inseparable, and finally with Durant hitting a three-pointer, the Gray Thunder entered the second quarter with a 23-21 lead.

The Thunder went into the break with a two-point lead after the first quarter!

It was also at this time that in the eyes of many Thunder fans, the Thunder could win this game, because in four games, the Thunder had an advantage during the bench rotation!

So when the Thunder team led by two points into the second quarter, in the eyes of many Thunder fans, this was a sign that the Thunder team was going to win, but as a result, Harden made continuous mistakes, which made the Thunder repeatedly futile on the offensive end, and even the Grizzlies seized the opportunity to score wave after wave, James Harden had no effect during this time!

Kevin Durant's appearance on the court during that time didn't make much difference to this team, they have been pressed and beaten by the Grizzlies! Until the middle of the second quarter, the Thunder hit 4 consecutive three-pointers under the leadership of Kevin Durant to overtake the score, but at this time, Westbrook had consecutive fouls!

He's another reason why the Thunder lost!

Westbrook left the court with six fouls in this game, and he was completely like a headless fly on the court during the entire regular time of the Thunder, and even got into the tip of the horns, and it was also during this time that the Grizzlies launched a counterattack under the leadership of Gasol Jr., and played an 8:2 small ** in the last 1 minute and 40 seconds of the quarter, and fixed the halftime score at 54:51!

The Grizzlies instead overtook the score in the first half, which is something that Thunder fans didn't expect!

Marc Gasol, a player known for his defense, scored 9 points in this quarter and made a total of 4 fouls for the Thunder, and he can be said to be turning the tide on the Thunder's inside, completely recreating the style they played when they were with the Spurs!

But even if they were behind at halftime, the Thunder fans were still not too worried, after all, they were 3 points behind! They believe that the Thunder at home will not be able to keep playing as chaotic as in the second quarter of the first half!

Yes, they really didn't expect Westbrook to leave the game with six fouls in this game, and this guy is really something that no one expected to be so sharp at a critical moment!

They all believe that Kevin Durant will play a very bright performance in the second half and then help the team to the Finals!

At a time when fans all over the United States are paying attention to Yi Jianlian, Thunder fans are also witnessing the growth of Kevin Durant, and they have watched Durant officially grow from a talented man with unlimited potential to a super scorer!

And in the process of Kevin Durant's growth, fans have also seen his wonderful operation to save the team again and again!

And Kevin Durant really didn't disappoint everyone!

In the second half, the two sides changed sides and fought again, Kevin Durant made a big show in the third quarter, scoring 15 points in a row, and in this league, it is not easy for any player to score double-digit points in a single quarter!

But there are so many players, even if they do, no one will be surprised, such as Yi Jianlian, and Kevin Durant, now in the eyes of many experts, as long as he enters the scoring mode, then the only thing that can stop him is his own touch, and Westbrook!

Westbrook: ???

However, the point difference did not widen as the fans imagined, and the Grizzlies relied on the advantages of the inside twin towers to support and keep the score at an even level, but at this time, the Grizzlies also exposed a big problem, hand-to-hand combat made their physical consumption very fast, and with the consumption of physical energy, their free throw shooting rate began to decline significantly, the main attacker of the Thunder team is Kevin Durant, whether he is tired or not, let him stand on the free throw line, it is no different from sending points, It was also with the difference in shooting percentage at the free throw line that Kevin Durant successfully helped the team overtake the score, and the Grizzlies entered the fourth quarter with a score of 69-74.

The 5-point margin is not small to say, but it is really not big to say that it is big, at least for the Grizzlies, it does not make a difference.

At the beginning of the fourth quarter, the Grizzlies' two big outside lines, Tony Allen and Mike Conley, took turns firing, and Tony Allen also found the crosshairs in this game, saying that he was even worse than Sephorosa, but as a result, these two guys played a very good offensive performance at such a critical time, which also made this game extraordinarily intense!

It's also because the Grizzlies also have an X factor, and the end result is that the Grizzlies won!

But even so, the Thunder, led by Durant, still had a stalemate with the Grizzlies.

But with 1:58 left in the game, Mike Conley hit a crucial three-pointer!

Yes, there is a very big reason why the Grizzlies were able to win this game, in addition to their strong interior play as always, their outside line, especially the team's outside core Mike Conley played well, contributing a quasi-triple-double of 26 points, 10 rebounds and 9 assists, and also hit multiple key shots like this three-point shot.

After hitting this three-pointer, Kevin Durant forced a three-point miss, tilting the balance of victory in favor of the Grizzlies, and Mike Conley, who controlled the offensive time to the last few seconds at this time, hit a mid-range shot again, and the score was stretched to 94:90!

With the Grizzlies leading, the Thunder, who had little time left, were forced to resort to foul tactics, but their shots were one of two, and Conley and Randolph's free throws were three of four, and the game lost meaning, and finally with Kevin Durant's angry three-point miss, the score was fixed at 99:93, and the Grizzlies pulled one back and pulled the big score to 3-2!