The Lakers players ran out of the United Center arena with a swollen nose and a swollen face, and Zaisao's post-game press conference was difficult to make Zhang Fu decent after two consecutive defeats, even if he cut an amazing triple-double of 39 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists, but the loss could not add much points to him.

Harris lost sleep again after he went back, no wonder his hair is so white, the NBA head coach is a very laborious job, most of the credit for winning is shared by the players, and most of the blame for losing is the head coach's back.

The Lakers have actually formed a tug-of-war with the Bulls most of the time in these three games, except for the last moment of the third game, which was beaten by a wave of scoring drought and lost a lot, but the remaining two games are single-digit points apart, which proves that the Lakers have a chance to beat the Bulls, but they are so bad.

But how to hold this breath, Harris is already racking his brains to think about countermeasures, but unfortunately in the case of the card is not as good as the opponent, it is really not easy to hold back the big move.

The Lakers used three different strategies in these three games, and only relied on the one that broke out to win the game, but can such a victory be used as a reference?

However, Harris at least understands that it will not work to continue to find a way on the offensive end, and West is right, the brand they laid at the beginning of the team is not a small-ball tactic, nor a big offensive basketball, but a strong defensive foundation, supplemented by a stable positional offense, sharp defensive counterattacks, and Zhang Yu's invincible singles, this path is the right direction for the Lakers to go all the way and finally win the championship.

The problem now is that their foothold defense doesn't seem to be able to successfully limit the Bulls' offense, and counterattacks and singles can't destroy the Bulls, so as long as they find a way to make their defense a little more intense, make their counterattacks a little sharper, and make their singles a little more ferocious, is that better than taking a small road?

The day after the Lakers lost, the outside media and black fans were throwing bombs at the Lakers with Gulf War-like bombing, but the latter had already shrunk his head and was healing with an absolute defense away from TV, newspapers, and the Internet, while accumulating the strength to fight again.

Harris spent the night discussing with West last night and finally decided that he had to go back to the original direction and get back on the road, and while it may be too late to do so, it won't be a matter of time before he continues on the wrong path.

But regaining a foothold on the defensive, a myriad of problems will follow.

First, how to strengthen the historic defense again? How do they push their limits?

Jerry West feels that they have to find flaws not only from themselves, but also from their opponents, and that two of the so-called Big Three are very old, and the other is too young.

What are the weaknesses of the Bulls Big Three? In fact, just for their age, if the Lakers can control the rhythm and let the Bulls play at their own pace, then at least it won't make things worse.

If you think about it, Jordan was almost invisible in the first half of this series, and Barkley's performance will decline in the final quarter, which is actually a physical performance that can't last a whole game, and the Big Three have been allocating everyone's acting time, and they have to disrupt this rational planning and find a way to keep the two old guys in a state of exhaustion all the time.

Also, they have to take a fresh look at their defense, what exactly is the strength of the Lakers' defense?

This question, as long as it is a veteran Lakers fan, can answer, the Lakers' defense is strong in that there are no shortcomings from the No. 1 position to the No. 5 defense, from the outside gate composed of Kidd and Jones and Zhang Zhu, to the no-fly zone composed of Mason and Mutombo, whether it is Barkley's mid-range shot and face frame, or Jordan and Hill's breakthrough, the Lakers should make the Bulls' offense feel very uncomfortable, plus Starks and Big Ben on the bench, how can it be so easy for the Bulls to win.

In the first three games, Barkley's face frame and mid-range shot were a great threat to the Lakers, and he made Mutombo unable to walk out of the restricted area at will to put pressure on the outside line of the Bulls, which required the coaching staff to find Mason alone for psychological counseling and arrange detailed countermeasures, and even needed Zhang Yu to appease this little brother who was no longer trusted by him, in short, Mason must be given 120% of the state to limit Barkley's breakthrough, it is really not possible to let the big ass shoot in the middle and long distance, But he must not be allowed to interfere with Mutombo's wide-ranging maneuvering defense, otherwise the role of the best defensive player will be lost at least half.

The Lakers' interior line needs to let Barkley roll outside to shoot, but Jordan and Hill, the Lakers want them to rush in more often, so that Mutombo doesn't have to always pull out and sweep, and he can use his best skills against Jordan and Hill in the restricted area.

Jerry West isn't a coach, but he has someone who offers Harris an idea of whether the Lakers' defensive strategy can be changed to deliberately leak people to Mutombo on the inside, and Hill doesn't care about him outside the three-point line, so that he can also trap a more critical ball-handler on the perimeter.

The second issue is speed and fitness.

As a younger team, the Lakers should not have an advantage in speed, but blindly strengthening the offense does not really reflect their speed advantage, but falls into the trap of the Bulls.

What kind of coach is Don Nelson?

He's one of the initiators of the crazy small-ball game, and he definitely uses his speed more than Harris, and if the Lakers continue to play offensive basketball, it will only allow the Bulls to find an opportunity to make up for their lack of speed and defense.

The reason is very simple, although the Bulls players are older, they are better at playing small-ball tactics than the Lakers, so they are naturally more familiar with how to defend this style of play, and the Lakers can no longer fight hard in the field that the opponent is good at, that is to find their own death.

In the next game, the Lakers need to reduce unnecessary speed, increase the quality of defensive counterattacks, especially increase the fierce battle of positional warfare, these are the ways that Don Nelson is not good at coping, and they are also the most consuming Bulls play, and the Lakers need to know when to speed up to make the Bulls players uncomfortable.

The third problem is offense.

The Lakers don't need to play against the Bulls offensively, but that doesn't mean they won't attack, they can't kill people on defense alone, they just have to play smarter.

Jones was still targeted by the Bulls in Game 3, and his performance was once again delayed, and his self-confidence was almost gone.

The Lakers are already inferior in strength, and there must not be such a loophole at this time, psychological counseling is essential for him, and how to effectively solve his problems must also be carried out quickly.

On the defensive end, the Lakers can let him defend Jordan's shooting from close range, which can be done with his footwork, and as for Jordan's breakthrough, he can simply let it go, and Mutombo can help him fill in the leaks on the inside.

On the offensive end, the Lakers must use more layered blocking and pick-and-roll, although Jones is not good at confrontation, he has top physical fitness, the Lakers don't need to let him attack with the ball anymore, they can use Mutombo and Mason, and even Zhang Mao's cover to help him get rid of defense.

However, Jones' style of play is not based on scoring, but to disrupt the Bulls' defensive formation, and only when he gets an absolute scoring opportunity, the Lakers will pass the ball for him to shoot, otherwise all his runs are to create a more comfortable space for Zhang Zhu.

The fourth question is, what should be Zhang Fu's task?

There is no doubt that he has to do everything, especially on the offensive end, and Zhang has to take on more responsibility. Although 60 points are not available in every game, 40 points must be scored in every game, and at the same time, you must contribute more than 7 assists, rebounds, blocks, and steals...... In a word, Zhang Qi must play super all-round data, preferably a big triple-double data, so as to activate the whole team and make up for the gap in the strength of the two teams.

The fifth question, substitutions.

The Lakers' bench is also awesome when he says it is awesome, and it is garbage when he says it is garbage, which has to test the timing and correctness of the head coach's substitution.

Starks and Big Ben may not be sexy enough, but they have the ability to play in the Finals, including O'Neal Jr., Darrick Martin and Wilkins, and if they can be replaced at the right time and in the right place, these small roles are not without their role.

These guys, if they press the ball carrier all over the court as soon as they get on the court, and do some aggressive defense and fouls on the Big Three, it will not be useless.

Harris didn't dare to give these benches a chance to play in the first three games, but now that the overall score is 1:2, and he is so cautious that he doesn't dare to use the bench, the Lakers are really going to face a 1:3 situation.

However, both of them forgot one thing, and that is that people always know the right way to do things, but the hardest thing is to do it.

In the fourth game, the Lakers were under indigestible pressure, and no team in NBA history has been able to turn the tables and win the championship with a 1:3 score down during the Finals, and there have only been 5 instances in the entire playoff history where a 3-1 lead was overturned.

So, if they don't win this game, the Lakers will be sentenced to death, and their title defense will be over 99.9%, when all their achievements in the regular season will turn into a joke that people make fun of them.

And in this battle, the Lakers have made too many changes, so much so that Harris has to take a small notebook to write down these points, and ask the players that they only have one day, how can they laugh at these tasks and solve these problems?

Zhang Zhu rarely didn't say anything at the pre-match press conference this time, because even he felt that the pressure was too great and there were too many tasks at hand, so it was strange that other players could perform well.

Sure enough, the game went in a direction that was extremely unfavorable to the Lakers from the start, as Jordan's first defense cut off Kidd's pass and went on a fast break, and then he still got free throws under the care of three Lakers defenders. Not long after, Barkley broke off Mason's basketball to launch a fast break, and Hill successfully scored 2+1.

These two mistakes were too fatal, and the Lakers' offensive rhythm was chaotic all of a sudden, and they failed to adjust well throughout the first quarter, and were directly given a golden start of 22:12 by the Bulls, and they scored a pitiful 12 points in the first quarter.

In the second quarter, Zhang was forced to use his individual mode in advance, and in the face of the heavy siege of the Bulls players, he continued to pass the ball to his teammates to score under frequent pinching, and at one point narrowed the gap to 4 points.

However, the Bulls players felt surprisingly good today, and then broke out again, and used various difficult shots to hit an 11-4 small climax without the Lakers making mistakes, which once again suppressed the morale of the Lakers just mentioned.

To be honest, at this time, in addition to allowing yourself to score, there is really no good way, any team has a burst of hands, but the Bulls broke out at this time, no matter how strong the mentality of the Lakers players is, they can't stand the blows one after another, and then they missed consecutive shots, and the Bulls directly expanded the advantage to 23 points in front of halftime in the second quarter, basically announcing the death sentence of the Lakers in this game.

Zhang Yu said a lot of encouraging words to his teammates in the middle of the field, but the effect was very weak, the players have not yet digested the blow suffered in the first half, at this time he even said the flowers useless, not to mention that even he himself did not recover from the blow.

After the start of the second half, the Bulls players relaxed a little, but the Lakers players did not have enough chasing points, the pre-game plan had long been in vain at this time, and the Lakers could only rely on Zhang Zhu's personal offense to score points, but Zhang Zhu's 8 shots in the quarter were obviously inefficient, and the Bulls still entered the final quarter with a 19-point advantage under relaxation.

In the last quarter, the Lakers players finally accumulated some fighting spirit and planned to fight hard, but unfortunately the bad feeling of the whole team made their counterattack thunder and rain small, and they fought for a long time until there were 6 minutes left before they found that the relationship had narrowed the gap by one point in such a long time, and even Zhang Yu was not in the mood to work hard.

The final score was 85:70, and the Lakers almost failed to score 70 points this time after scoring less than 90 points in two consecutive games, and now even many Lakers fans feel that they should have little chance.

"Leon, do you think you still have a chance to turn the tables?"

"Leon, can you imagine that you are about to be eliminated by 4:1?"

"Leon, have you ever thought that you almost didn't score 70 points today?"

"Lyon, the Lakers won 76 wins in the regular season and 39 in a row, but in the end they couldn't win the championship, will it be a joke in the future?"

"Leon, can you tell us about the national anthem of the Kingdom of Tamriel?"

“……”

These are the questions asked at the post-match press conference, Zhang Mao had already thought of this scene at the moment of the loss, so he asked most of his teammates to attend today's post-match press conference, and they all need a strong stimulus to have the motivation to fight back.

Zhang Yu himself was in an equally bad mood, but he knew that if he didn't do something at this time, and if he didn't stand up and say something, maybe the low morale and the collapse of his mentality alone would leave them without any hope.

Thankfully, the Chicago reporters helped him create the right atmosphere at the crucial moment, and these people held their heads high at the press conference, like a proud rooster, and mocked them in every way with a condescending posture and tone.

Zhang Yu waited for all kinds of ridicule from these people, so he patiently waited for these guys to ask a lot of questions that made the mentality of Lakers players change from sadness to anger and finally to gnashing teeth, and finally reached out and took the microphone, and said with a calm face: "You don't have to fall into the trap anymore, we know very well what happens to the losers, history has always been written by the winners, although it is full of lies." I can already see one of the versions, and two days later, if the Bulls win and we lose, their glory will be recorded, and our efforts and glory will be erased as a joke in an instant. All of them will be heroes, and we will be evil villains, because all that is needed to change people's perceptions is a few stories and a championship trophy. Now I can tell that the people here are excited because the Bulls are about to finish the worst lie in NBA history. They will be the greatest champions, and we will be the insignificant losers. But this ending will only be true if they survive and we die. ”