At this time, Gan Guoyang and the Portland Trail Blazers players have not yet realized the coming of danger, and perhaps only Gan Guoyang smells a trace of danger.

After arriving in Indiana, the Trail Blazers suffered their first injury of the season, with Buck Williams straining his calf in pregame training after the game against his former club, and the exact condition of the injury will not be diagnosed until he returns to Portland.

For an interior player who has been in the NBA for many years and is still an under-size player, it is normal to be covered with injuries, and the intensity of the Trail Blazers' current team training is also very large.

It's normal for Williams to be plagued by injuries, and the Trail Blazers' front line can be described as overcrowded, with a Bucks down, and someone behind them who can step up.

Later, while watching the news at the end of practice, everyone took notice of Reggie Miller's declaration that he threatened to end the Trail Blazers' winning streak in this game, which the Pacers have won just two games so far.

At this time, Reggie Miller is just a sophomore scoring guard, and he can only be said to be well-known in the league, because of his three-point shot, he is not close to the star at present, but is only considered a potential newcomer.

One of the Pacers' really strong players is their outside star, "Rifleman" Chuck Payson, who is also an excellent marksman, who entered the league just a year earlier than Miller, but is already the Pacers' number one star.

However, Miller was able to get the team's first three-point score next to him, which is enough to show the level of Miller's shooting.

And then there's their interior line, Herb Williams, a 6-foot-10 center, has been with the Pacers since entering the league, working diligently, from an average of 11 plus 7 centers per game, gradually improving to an average of 19 plus 9 per game, which can be described as one step at a time, but this season, his form has begun to decline, and with the Pacers' poor record, he has also begun to be involved in trade messages.

For these two people, Gan Guoyang is not too worried, but for Reggie Miller, this guy who can be called a nobody, Gan Guoyang knows that he has amazing explosive power on his body.

"You seem to be worried, Gan." Before the start of the game, when the team came to the stadium for training, assistant coach Bellman noticed that when Gan Guoyang practiced three points, he missed five shots in a row, and the more he shot, the more chaotic the rhythm became, which was a manifestation of Gan Guoyang's heart.

'Yes, I'm a little worried, everybody's worried, worried, when we're going to lose the first game, it's going to come, but everybody's staring at us, we're waiting for that day, and we're trying to avoid it, so it's really tiring. Gan Guoyang put away the ball and said to Bellman.

Judging from the last game, the Trail Blazers' players are still in very good shape, and most of their victories are relatively easy, rarely fighting until the last minute, but the pressure is increasing on everyone.

When Buck Williams was injured, Jerome Cauchy even said to Williams: "I envy you for being injured at this time." ”

"Are you worried about Reggie? I remember in the high school finals, you also had this kind of worry, what were you afraid of him? "Bellman remembered that final eight years ago." I'm not scared, I'm just ...... I just feel a little different from others. Reggie is really special, but he doesn't scare me so much, in fact, I'm more worried about the state of the whole team, and the impact of Buck's injury may be greater than we think. I'm worried about whether Avedas will be able to take on the role of starter, and he looks a little too nervous. ”

For the current Gan Guoyang, although Reggie Miller's future fame will make him a little worried, as a mature NBA player, he is no longer the high school student, and he knows that it is not Reggie Miller who can stop the Trail Blazers, but the Trail Blazers themselves.

After the injury of Buck Williams, Adelman discussed with the coaching staff and decided to push Sabonis into the starting lineup, which is the ideal starting lineup that Adelman has always envisioned and what Gan Guoyang has requested.

Originally, Adelman was hesitant to get Buck Williams, who had played well, back to the bench, but now Williams' injury has given Sabonis a chance.

And according to the current news in the press, Gorbachev's visit to the United States is imminent, and the Trail Blazers will soon have a game to be selected as the top leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union.

Gan Guoyang, as the core player of the team, himself recommended Sabonis to start, but Gan Guoyang's original idea was to let Sabonis start, play more than 20 minutes per game, and let Williams be the sixth man, and his playing time will be longer.

Because Gan Guoyang believes that the defensive pressure at the beginning is small, Sabonis's strategy and passing can be brought into play, enhancing the current Trail Blazers' relatively weak position offense, and enriching the team's tactical level.

And when it came to the game, Williams, as a defensive and experienced veteran, was on the field with Gan Guoyang, who could better control the situation, and Williams was obviously more reliable than Sabonis at critical moments.

This rotation strategy is also endorsed by Adelman, Sabonis can make the Trail Blazers' bench deeper and more diverse, which not only gives Sabonis a chance to exercise, but also allows Williams to reposition himself and find a more suitable position for him.

That scenario was dashed with Williams' injury, and now Sabonis has to be ducked off the shelves and put straight into the starting line-up.

Before the game, Gan Guoyang also talked to Sabonis, and the two chatted about their views on the team's tactics, Sabonis still seems to be a little confused about how to better play the starting position, after all, the requirements of starters are still very different from those of substitutes.

The most important thing for starters on the field is the word "stability", in the case that both sides are on the same starting line, it is often the first person who makes a mistake to be beaten, how to compete and control the rhythm on the field, it takes more experience or talent.

When the substitute players come on the field, the situation on the field has often been opened, either stalemate, or a big lead, or all the way behind, so the most important thing for the substitute is to "change", to have the ability to change the current situation on the field, so excellent substitute players are either energetic young players, they are good at stirring up the situation to bring variables; Either that's an experienced veteran who knows how to read the situation on the pitch and understand the coach's intentions to bring about the changes he deserves.

Sabonis, as a newcomer to the NBA, is characterized by change, every time he plays, he can always bring changes to the Trail Blazers' offense, especially the attributes that come with the liberation of Gan Guoyang, so that Gan Guoyang can let go of his hands and firepower, and will always catch the opponent off guard.

However, the fact that he is now a starter and lacks pre-match transition training does make him a little uncomfortable.

Adelman also considered letting Duckworth start, but Duckworth overlapped with Gan Guoyang in terms of function, and it was impossible to let Gan Guoyang sit on the bench, anyway, he would also cultivate Sabonis in the future, so he was given this opportunity.

………………

Gan Guoyang tried to say hello to Miller before the game started, but this guy had a good relationship with Gan Guoyang on weekdays, and when he came to the arena, he began to ignore Gan Guoyang, Gan Guoyang also understood Miller's mood, since Miller snatched a championship from Gan Guoyang in high school, Gan Guoyang has not let Miller feel good.

Miller, who wanted to be able to give Gan Guoyang a fatal blow in the high school arena back then, seems to be getting bigger and bigger with Gan Guoyang at present, not to mention entering the NBA three years late, and now the two are very different in terms of momentum in the league.

Gan Guoyang is a hot superstar, while Miller is just a potential star in people's eyes, and how many years he can stay in the NBA is a question.

The trend after the start of the game was also as expected, the Trail Blazers had the advantage from the beginning, Gan Guoyang was ruthless in the interior attack, but Sabonis did not play as well as he should, he made a series of mistakes on the offensive end, and always fouled on the defensive end, and Sabonis was replaced with two fouls just five minutes into the first quarter.

Sabonis's performance disrupted the Trail Blazers' rhythm, but the Trail Blazers still relied on their strength to maintain a large lead, and Drexler had the upper hand against Miller, who was not at all a match for the strong, fast Drexler.

However, when the two sides entered the bench rotation, the situation on the court changed, and it was not Reggie Miller who Gan Guoyang expected to change the situation on the court tonight, but the Pacers' sixth man, Weiman Disdale.

As the 1985 All-Round Show, Wiman Disdale, who was drafted after Ewing, did not become the Pacers' chosen son in Indiana, and his greatest achievement in the future was not basketball, but music.

However, tonight, Disdale, the 6-foot-9 power forward, played his value, and as the sixth man on the bench, he turned over the Trail Blazers' interior line, constantly causing fouls and free throws from the Trail Blazers' interior.

Without Buck Williams, Kenny Johnson, who replaced him, couldn't limit Disdale at all, and Gan Guoyang had a heavier responsibility on his shoulders, and it was impossible for the other party to rely on him to block every firepower point appeared.

Disdale's power allowed the Pacers to slowly turn the tide of the situation, and the big mouth trash talk of "Rifleman" Payson also came into play, and his rambling trash talk in defense finally provoked Drexler to get angry, elbowing Payson on an attack, and then he was awarded a malicious foul and ejected by the referee.

The morale of the Trail Blazers, who have continuously lost their generals, has been severely hit, and they can only rely on Gan Guoyang, who scored 41 points and 11 rebounds in the game.

In the fourth quarter, after the Pacers overtook the score by four points, Gan Guoyang chased the score to only one point with a difficult three-pointer from the outside, which was the only three-pointer he shot in the game and his 41st point.

But then, Reggie Miller immediately returned the favor, and he also hit a three-pointer, which was also the only three-pointer Miller shot in the game, which was only Miller's 11th point.

41 points and 11 points, a huge difference, but Miller extinguished the flames of the Trail Blazers' counterattack with an "Answer-Ball" and gave the Trail Blazers their first loss of the season.