Chapter 40: Round of 16
At 37:39 at the end of the first half, under the attack of Li Mojie, the University of Louisville Cardinals trailed by two points.
But in the second half, after halftime adjustments, the Cardinals gradually found their offensive touch, with center Gorgui and point guard Will scoring back-to-back.
But looking back, the Trojans felt cold in the second half, and the core engine Li Mojie was always followed by two people.
Kenny begins to speak for Lee. "Lee Mojie often started the Pacific 12 League, at that time, the opponent's defensive focus was on Li Mojie, this game the Cardinals were determined to contain Li Mojie, and then others paid attention to cutting off Li Mojie and his teammates, and he attracted the attention of Payton and Luke, the two major defensive players."
"There is Li Mojie to attract defense, and Li Mojie is not a person like Kobe Bryant who has to shoot strongly. Teammates can calmly attack and defend weak points, which is why the rest of the Trojans team's statistics are not bad, but in this game, the Trojans' interior line is still suppressed, and Richardson, the only one who can shoot three points on the outside, is also watched, what should the Trojans do? Brin also affirmed the role of Li Mojie.
Off-the-court Coach Neil stomped his feet on the sidelines, and Cardinals coach Rick muttered, "It depends on when the rest of the Trojans feel hot." β
The Kentucky Radio commentary praised the Cardinals' defense, which was at the level of an NCAA champion team, both individually and in a joint defense.
In fact, at this time, the Cardinals are also betting, betting that the rest of the Trojans have a bad hand, but the Cardinals have a 6-foot-11 center, and the inside line firmly suppresses the Trojans, as long as the Trojans miss, then the rebounds can also fall into the hands of the Cardinals.
Ben didn't shoot strongly, he and Charles were strictly the ones who were let go, and the rebound went to the Cardinals, so the Cardinals' Will was not in a hurry, waiting for all his teammates to settle into the halfcourt, and then began to organize the offense, a pass, a pass was very patient, and finally fell into the hands of Luke, who easily hit a two-point shot. 46:51γ Li Mojie ran circles with Peyton, but found that no matter how provocative he was, this black man ran with Li Mojie with a black face, and Peyton had the ability to shoot, how could he be empty?
Looking back, it was the old duo of Li Mojie and Anderson who blocked and dismantled.
Li Mojie plays blocking and dismantling in the high position, the breakthrough speed is very fast, and his height is 203CM, plus attack skills such as crab step, the cardinals are very afraid of him inside. But as soon as the interior is retracted, Anderson can hit the high post and go small, and he is the highest shooting percentage on the Trojans.
I saw that the cardinals on the opposite side still wanted to wrap Li Mojie, but this time Li Mojie slammed into Luke strongly, Gorji didn't expect that Li Mojie, who has always played reasonably, would now face the bag and fight hard, he was staring at Anderson, only to see Li Mojie coming unabated, kicking hard with his left foot, grabbing the ball with his right hand, and pounced on the ball.
βpeng!β With one hand, the basket creaked and made an overwhelmed sound.
"Buckle, oh! Oh, my God? Is the Cardinals, the center, stupid? The DJ at the Banks' Life Arena shouted.
"Wo!" The audience was also cheering.
"That's it, kill these hillbillies." You don't need to look at it to know that it's from the Los Angeles audience, and the people in the city of Los Angeles look at people in other states as if they were city people looking at country people.
"It's so handsome!" In the first row on the sidelines, there was a fashionable girl with long black hair, a thin waist and long legs, and a flat-chested standard model, who stood up and cheered.
A beautiful woman with wavy blonde hair next to her also shouted: "Kendall, he is so handsome, it simply subverts my impression of Asians!" β
"yes, Gigi, he's so charming, I'll have to ask for his phone later." Kardashian said as she cheered.
"Give him my phone number too." Gigi Hadid also hurriedly said.
"Don't think about it." Unexpectedly, Jenkina's little sister said without looking back.
"Hmph, then I'll go by myself." Gigi also tilted his head and said in a coquettish voice.
When it came to the Cardinals' offense, Luke couldn't relax just standing outside the three-point line, Li Mojie couldn't help his teammates defend, and watched Will and Jill block and dismantle smoothly, and then Will ran a big lap to make an empty space, Gorgui passed the ball to Will, and Will shot.
Looking back, Coach Rick of the Cardinals made adjustments on the sidelines, yelling loudly, and the Cardinals changed their joint defense and put Payton in charge of the middle, in order to prevent the Trojans from Li Mojie and Anderson's high blocking, Payton is good at defending the guard heads-up, and can also interfere with Anderson's jump shot at this position.
This change had an immediate effect, the Trojans could not play the middle block and cooperate at will, and Li Mojie would quickly change the defense against Gorgi, who was one size taller than him in terms of arm span, after breaking through, and could only share the ball. The Trojans were helpless against the Cardinals, and the offensive time was a full 35 seconds, and finally passed to Richardson, who did not get rid of the defender and missed the shot.
Gorgui picked up the backcourt rebound and passed it to Will. Although he was dunked just now, he felt a big loss of face, but immediately Coach Rick comforted him on the sidelines: No matter how beautiful he deducted, but two points are two points, the victory in this game is still our Cardinals!
Before you know it, the Cardinals are starting to widen the gap in the score.
But in the next attack, Li Mojie didn't rely on cover, squeezed Luke from the bottom corner to the left 50 degrees to catch the ball, he used the back skills he had been practicing, took the ball and leaned against Luke, pushed it hard, and turned to the right side to shoot.
He moved very smoothly, almost did not jump, turned to the right with his left foot as the axis, and leaned back, Luke was very close but could not cover it, and Li Mojie scored again at 45 degrees.
"Beautiful, the Cardinals can't be wrapped forever, the Trojans are very open, Li Mojie ran without the ball first, and beat Luke with the ball, Luke, the substitute small forward, is not Li Mojie's opponent at all." Brin was impressed by Major's ball intelligence and on-court adaptability.
Luke's current physique is not only comparable to Lee Mojab, but also too thin compared to other shooting guards. He is good at running three-pointers, and although he is also 201cm tall, his physique and style of play are more like a shooting guard.
But the score still did not mean to be closer, the gap between the inside line made the Cardinals easy to shoot, this time Li Mojie followed Luke, but it should have been the Cardinals coach Rick who ordered, Li Mojie stared at whomever he wanted, whoever took Li Mojie to run in circles, and the offense would be fine with you. And Luke made 3 of 6 three-pointers in this game, how dare Li Mojie leave him?
Will missed, Gorgui grabbed the rebound and passed to Jill, Gill turned around in the face of Anderson's back, Anderson blocked in time, and Gill hit the board. 63οΌ53γ
Looking back, Li Mojie dribbled directly across the half court, and his face became more and more calm, but those who are familiar with Li Mojie know that this is a manifestation of his growing anger.
I saw that Li Mojie didn't say anything, and in the face of Luke and Payton's defense, he used Anderson and Charles to make a double cover, and used his speed to kill the inside.
"This speed and explosiveness!" Both Kenny and off-court scouts were once again amazed by Lee's athleticism.
"Look at me with a big hat and risk death to take revenge!" Gorji also pounced and yelled at Li Mojie.
But Li Mojie did not face Gorji's strong play this time, but a pull rod in the air, grabbed the ball with his right hand to avoid Gorji's block, and "snapped" is the pull-up layup that guards often use to hit the inside line.
"Beautiful pull-up layup, I always thought that Kobe Bryant's pull-up when he first entered the league was the most beautiful, but Mo Jayer's waist and abdominal strength and core strength are not lost to Kobe Bryant!" Brin sighed.
But the Cardinals were desperate, still holding on to 35 seconds of offensive time, passing around patiently, and finally Payton shot and missed.
"Mine." This time, Charles withstood Gorguis, and neither of them grabbed the rebound, but Mo Jay, who rushed to the basket, used his passing bounce and speed to grab the key backcourt rebound.
The game continued, and Li Mojie fell into the encirclement of Luke and Payton, and couldn't make an easy shot, so he passed to Anderson, who missed the shot.
The Cardinals played an inside attack, hoisting the ball to the basket again and again to Gorji, Gill attracted the defense after blocking and dismantling in the middle, and cut to receive Gorgi's pass inside at any time, Will was 60 degrees on the right side, Payton was in the bottom corner, and Luke took Li Mojie to run in circles.
The fixed position gives Gorgui the advantage of his height.
In the first half, Gorgi went to the middle to block and then made a jumper, and the small guard broke through, but Charles couldn't prevent it.
Li Mojie followed Luke and couldn't retract the penalty area to help defend, and after defending once, Luke immediately hit a three-pointer on the right side. Even Usain Bolt's speed can't rush from near the box to the three-point line in an instant, interfering with the player's shot.
With five minutes remaining, Payton hit his second three-pointer of the game in the corner to stretch the margin to 15 points.
In the last few minutes, Li Mojie wanted to stand up to help the team, "It's still Li Mojie, or he stood up, a false shake, shook off Payton, and the speed did not slow down to kill the inside, but Gorgui made a timely foul." β
Li Mojie hit the first free throw, but the second free throw was missed due to excessive physical exertion, and the Cardinals rebounded.
Then it was another 35-second offense, and Gill hit a two-point shot.
"Li Mojie still didn't give up, and hit the inside line again and again." This time, Gorji still wanted to pounce, but he didn't expect Li Mojie to pass the ball to Charles behind Gorji.
Charles clasped both hands successfully. But looking back, Gorgui successfully licked the basket to continue to open the score, and immediately the Trojans still relied on Li Mojie to score two more points.
"There are three minutes left in the game, there are still 12 points left in the score, and the game is over." Brin said with a sigh.
"I don't think you need to say it, the USC fans already have the answers, everything in the stands is clear," Kenny said, pointing to the surrounding stands. 78-66, the Cardinals had an overwhelming advantage.
"Half sea, half fire, Kenny is right," Brin also looked around the stands, the University of Louisville fans singing and dancing, and the Southern California fans were silent and bitter.
"Good ball, Li Mojie hasn't given up yet," Kenny suddenly exclaimed.
"It's a good ball indeed, straight to the basket in the middle, jumping on Payton, avoiding Jill's block in the air, a big pull-up layup, it's the perfect embodiment of speed, power, intelligence and feel." Brin nodded as well. Today's performance was beyond reproach.
"In this game, Li Mojie has scored 38 points, Anderson has 12 points, and the other USC players have only scored 16 points combined."
"Only Jacques Lee and Anderson were able to score in this game, and everyone else had a hard time scoring under the Cardinals' defense, which is completely a reflection of the overall strength, and if Southern California could have two pitchers like the Cardinals' Weir, neither of them would have lost so badly." As soon as Brin finished speaking, Kenny sighed: "Brin means that no matter how strong a person is, he can't change the fate of the team, and basketball is a five-person sport, right?"
"I don't think anyone knows what that means better than James, doesn't they?" Brin said suddenly.
"So he went to the Heat?" Kenny laughed.
At this point, Brin said, "Kenny, if you pick one of the current and historical NBA players to replace Lee Mo before the game, will you win this game?" β
Kenny mused, no.
"Why?" Brin was puzzled, Kenny's answer was too hasty.
Kenny then shook his head: "I just said, basketball is a five-person sport, Li Mojie has done the ultimate in this game, with the level he showed in this game can be famous in the classic battle of the NCAA, even if James may not be better than Li Mojie on the court, this game is not a question of whether a person is strong or not, but a question of whether a team is strong, simply put, the level of this game is very high, USC has only two players who have the ability to compete at this level, but Louisville, on the contrary, has six of them. β
"But Li Mojie still hasn't given up!" I saw Li Mojie's face unchanged, dragging his tired body, falling down and standing up again and again on the court, shooting, breaking through, and being fouled. The crowd, whether Trojans fans or not, were moved by this fighting spirit of never giving up.
"Oh, Kenny, look at that, the fans are standing up and applauding Mojie Lee!" Brin said, pointing to the audience.
"Yes, this kind of desire to win is several times stronger than ordinary people, and this kid must be a figure in the alliance."
Li Mojie's college game ended today, 81:76, and the Trojans lost to the round of 16.