Gan Guoyang can handle Mark West, of course, he can also handle Duckworth, on the court Gan Guoyang will rarely interfere with Adelman's on-the-spot command, but once he feels that a player should not stay on the field, then Adelman must also listen to his advice and replace this player.

After Gan Guoyang angrily accused West of giving him a lesson, the Suns called a timeout, and when he got to the bench, Gan Guoyang began to teach Duckworth that he must travel his duties well or he would have to sit on the bench.

Duckworth is lazy by nature, which is why he will continue to gain weight uncontrollably in the future, but as long as Gan Guoyang is there, he will not be able to slack off as the No. 1 sparring partner, Gan Guoyang is very strict with his teammates in training, anyone who does not do his best will be attacked by him, and then he will beat you up while taunting you with all kinds of trash talk to stimulate you, Duckworth is not less stimulated by Gan Guoyang, but also not less by Gan Guoyang's help.

In fact, Gan sometimes says to Duckworth, "If you feel like you're buried here, then you can go to a team that needs you and get a bigger contract, but only if you have enough quality, and playing with me can bring you that strength." ”

Therefore, under the spur of Gan Guoyang, Duckworth is still making very fast progress, but he is a little uncomfortable this time, after being scolded by Gan Guoyang, Duckworth took a few deep breaths, calmed down his mentality, and was ready to devote himself to the game.

The Suns didn't play fast offense in the first half of the first quarter, and their coach Fitzsimmons understood that the main reason why their score wasn't pulled away by the Trail Blazers was Mark West's constant swings, and the four frontcourt rebounds gave the Suns four new offensive opportunities, otherwise they would probably be pulled to around 10 points now.

"We need to tear their defenses, tear their defenses! Use your passing, use the degree to tear them apart, instead of relying on frontcourt rebounds, we won't always have frontcourt rebounds to grab, to find the offensive feel, we have terrible passing balls on the outside, we need to open up more space, kJ you and Hornacek, to make their defense a threat! Fitzsimmons is also a veteran coach in the NBA, and his favorite disciple was Pistol Pete Maravich, who loves Maravich's creative offensive talent and wants to see his players break down opposing defenses with projections and passes.

Hornacek doesn't have the kind of creativity that Maravich has, but he is calm, atmospheric, and calm, which complements Kevin Johnson's impact and passion very well.

Now that the Suns' lifeline is being snuffed out by the Trail Blazers' strong defense, someone needs to step up and fight for more opportunities for the Suns, rather than squandering opportunities on the outside.

Fitzsimmons is right about one thing, they won't always have frontcourt rebounds to grab, after the timeout, the Trail Blazers obviously strengthened their control of backcourt rebounds, Duckworth under Gan Guoyang's reminder, really stuck an inch of Mark West, stuck him behind him at all times, and didn't give him the slightest chance to impact the inside.

Of course, the Trail Blazers also began to shrink their defense appropriately, the Suns' frontcourt rebounding scramble was quite active, and the Trail Blazers who suffered losses needed to better protect the interior, which gave Kevin Johnson and Hornacek the opportunity to swing, and the pressure on the outside was suddenly a lot smaller, and the Suns' offense began to slowly become smoother.

But the score between the Suns and the Trail Blazers is still pulling away little by little, the Suns can score, Hornacek's projection and Johnson's breakthrough complement each other, and the offense is becoming more and more rhythmic, but the Trail Blazers' offense is more stable than them, they rely on two interior lines, Gan Guoyang and Duckworth.

After solving the problem on the defensive end, Duckworth finally began to show some differences from Sabonis, he will not play high positions, but his low post skills are better, he and Gan Guoyang take turns to chisel the Suns' interior in the low post, and the offensive efficiency is surprisingly high.

And the Suns have never been able to contain Gan Guoyang, Gan Guoyang holds the ball in the low or high position, he wants to play and let him play, Fitzsimmons believes that there are so many teams that contain Gan Guoyang, and few of them finally eat good fruit, and now Gan Guoyang's position is very cautious, it is difficult to easily contain him, Gan Guoyang's mistake control ability is the top among the centers, which has led to the Suns not choosing to clamp Gan Guoyang.

The consequences of this are obviously more serious, because Fitzsimmons is now playing, Gan Guoyang's offensive feeling has come out, and even the Trail Blazers on the defensive end have begun to tighten their pockets again.

In the third quarter, the first half barely followed the Trail Blazers, only eight points behind the Suns, instantly felt that the situation on the court had changed, the Trail Blazers' defense became more tight than in the first quarter, the outside repeatedly spared no effort to wrap and rotate, and targeted Kevin Johnson, who had average passing ability, in advance, targeted off-ball packing, Gan Guoyang covered the most important middle area, Kevin Duckworth is responsible for acting as the last big shield on the inside, this defensive system that has been trained by Bellman for many years, Wielded a huge amount of power, making the Suns, who lacked the ability to attack inside, suffer greatly.

Tom Chambers tried to play alone several times, but it was difficult to take advantage of Gan Guoyang's one-on-one defense, and Kevin Johnson at this time was just a second-year point guard, although his performance in the regular season was amazing, but in the playoffs, he was still a little tender, and with Gan Guoyang in the middle, he couldn't break through at all.

The league's offensive No. 1 team defeated the league's No. 2 offensive team with a steely defense in the game, showing the huge potential of the Trail Blazers.

"The Trail Blazers' defense is amazing, I would say, it's a credit to their assistant coach Bellman, you know when I was a head coach in the NBA, playing against the Trail Blazers, I knew that their assistant coach had a lot of ideas, and his defensive philosophy was some of the most basic ideas, but the value was that he could put those ideas together and put them into practice, and he built this defensive system for the Trail Blazers, and at the moment, it's very difficult for the Suns to break through this shackle without a strong interior line."

Hubby Brown's evaluation is very pertinent, the Trail Blazers' defense is indeed supported by many basic concepts, but there are some things that Hubby Brown didn't see, for example, Gan Guoyang deliberately leaked his right side for Kevin Johnson to break through from the left side, at this time the left side is the weak side of the Suns, but it is the strong side of the Trail Blazers, Johnson blindly broke through to the inside line into the trap of the Trail Blazers, and no one can pass the ball if he wants to pass, there is Gan Guoyang before Duckworth before the layup, and Johnson has eaten Gan Guoyang's three hats tonight.

"Come on, Kevin, you can be faster, faster, aren't you purple lightning? Oh I forgot, wooden floors don't conduct electricity. Gan Guoyang said to Johnson after successfully interfering with Kevin Johnson's layup again.

Johnson's nose is crooked, but he has never been a player who likes to quarrel with others, and the situation of the game has been completely controlled by Gan Guoyang, who also truly embodies the value of a top-level defensive inside, just like Bill Russell, when an interior defender can keep the opponent from scoring, then the situation of the game is controlled by him.

In the subsequent game, the sun was also dying, but the trailblazers did not let go at all, it seemed that the sun would not be completely strangled to death at the last moment, and the trailblazers would not relax, of course, this also led to the players on both sides getting stronger and stronger gunpowder, and the collision between the limbs became more and more intense.

Especially Kevin Johnson, he and Gan Guoyang are also good friends, Gan Guoyang is merciful to him and doesn't say too many ugly and provocative words, but Gan Guoyang seized the opportunity to chat with Johnson, talking about the two of them drinking together, playing together, and those things in high school, as long as there is a gap in the game, free throws, fouls, throw-ins, scrums, Gan Guoyang began to nag at him, making Kevin Johnson dizzy.

Gan Guoyang's "mental attack method" is easy not to use in the regular season, you consume other people's energy and consume your own energy, only in the playoffs, Gan Guoyang began to let it show its power, to the end, Kevin Johnson wanted to throw the ball away and quit the game directly, the Trail Blazers are a lot ahead, Gan Guoyang has a chance or does not let him go.

When the game was over and the Trail Blazers defeated the Suns 1o1:8o with a strong defensive pressure in the cheers of the fans, Kevin Johnson left the court without looking back, he really didn't want to see Gan Guoyang for one more second, this guy was so annoying.

This nightmare court experience did not end, two days later, in the memorial stadium Suns and Trail Blazers rematch, the process and result were similar to the first game, the Suns simply could not penetrate the Trail Blazers' impregnable defense, although the Trail Blazers' own offensive efficiency declined in Sabonis' absence, but their offense still maintained a normal level, in contrast, the Suns were naturally not the opponent of the Trail Blazers.

And Gan's gushing trash talk was taken to the extreme in this series, and after the Trail Blazers won all of them in a landslide after both games, the news media adopted the headline "Escape from Portland" to describe the Suns' embarrassment at the Portland Memorial Coliseum.

At this time, their only hope can only be pinned on the field of the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum.