After the China vs USA match, the players from both sides congratulated each other in a friendly atmosphere.

Yao Ming played in the NBA All-Star Game for the West and the East respectively, and has some friendship with the American team. Especially Hayes. Yao Ming was not polite to him at all, and said bluntly before the game: "Don't guard too tightly when you kid plays, you know how to ......"

"We all know this, don't worry." Hayes laughed.

The two sides have played four warm-up matches before, and they know each other's strength well, and it is impossible for the Chinese team to win. The U.S. knew this, so although they were stronger on the inside, the offense chose to shoot from the outside, hitting 14 three-pointers in the game.

The Olympic men's basketball competition format is a single round robin group, and the top four advance to the quarterfinals. After the Chinese team finished playing the American Dream 8 team, the next opponents were Spain, Angola, Germany and Greece. For China, this is a group of death. Regardless of the honor, just looking at the results of the confrontation, except for Angola, other teams almost have an overwhelming advantage over China. If you want to break through, you must use the horse racing tactics used by Tian Ji.

Most people have heard the allusion of "Tian Ji Horse Racing". "Take the king under the donkey and the other above, take the king above the donkey and the middle of the king, and take the king in the middle and the other under the other."

The Chinese team has a favorable schedule. The first two games against the United States and Spain, it doesn't matter if you lose, the main thing is to find the form and confidence of the players. The third game against Angola was a respite and a morale boost with a victory. The fourth game is the key, to fight hard with Germany, success or failure in one fell swoop. The last game leaves China with some leeway, and if Greece qualify early and wait for an opportunity to choose a knockout opponent, they may release the water so that China will not be completely out of action if they lose to Germany.

And the United States has no intention of massacring China in a big way. The reason is simple, China is the host, most of the people watching the game are Chinese, and no Chinese want to see the host being slaughtered. If Dream 8 plays China with all its strength in the first game, not only will it not win popularity, but it may also be cursed by the home fans in the next game. So the Dream 8 team chose to practice. It takes three points to break the defense, and they practiced three points on the outside.

The second match of the Dream 8 team is against the African champion Angola. There was no suspense in this game, with the United States winning by 46 points 118-72 and winning two in a row.

The two big wins did not make the stars of the Dream 8 team happy, and the third game was a revenge battle!

On August 14, the men's basketball group stage ushered in a key matchup, against the United States men's basketball team and the Greek men's basketball team.

At the World Championships two years ago, Greece upset the Dream 7 team to reach the final. The people who are most looking forward to this game are James, Wade, Anthony and other players who participated in the World Championships, and they all dream of a big victory over Greece to get revenge.

The 12 players in the Greek team are all from Europe.

Spanoolris, who won the NBA championship with the Rockets, didn't play well with the Spurs last season, and his three-point shooting percentage of less than 20% was always criticized. Halfway through last season, Spanollis abandoned the NBA to return to Europe after his mother fell ill and wanted to return to China to care for his father since his father had died.

Greece also has Papalukas, known as the strongest playmaking guard outside the NBA, and super defender Diamantidis. No country dares to underestimate such an external combination. And among the interior players, there are also outrageous devilish fat people like the little shark Sotersenidis.

The outside world predicts that Greece will face the United States, and although it will be difficult to win, at least it will not allow the United States to win easily.

Greek coach Giannakis also said before the game: "The USA team is not invincible, and I and the players always believe that. ”

The semifinals of the 2006 World Championship between the United States and Greece can be said to be the pinnacle of basketball since the birth of basketball, because they represent two completely different basketball philosophies and philosophies. Greece advocates overall basketball that puts defense first, while the United States pursues offensive basketball with superior individual ability, and they represent two directions of development in basketball.

After watching the performance of the Greek team at the World Championships, people know what it really means to win by defense. With no big stars, no core, Greece has shown the world the true art of basketball as a whole, and when they go one-on-one, they may be beaten by other teams in any position, but when they play as a whole with skillful coordination, fast rotation and pressing defense, they play a strength that is far greater than the sum of five people's abilities.

The scary thing about the U.S. team is that they have a strong offensive ability that surpasses other teams, so physical fitness and offense are the greatest assets of the United States. The United States adopts the tactics of attacking and leading the defense, while ensuring the offense, and then using the body and super individual athleticism on the defensive end to easily suppress the opponent's offense and force the opponent to make mistakes, so as to form a quick counterattack opportunity.

This aggressive defense made it easy for the U.S. to crush their opponents in the previous games, until Greece offered a way to beat the U.S. team: control the interior and force the U.S. to shoot outside the three-point line.

In order to take revenge on Greece, the United States dominated the outside attack in the first two games of this Olympics, and Ray Allen played more minutes than Wade. Billups also played more minutes than Chris Paul, who narrowly missed last season's MVP. The reason is that these two players are better at shooting threes.

Before the game, Coach K arranged the tactics of a triangle attack. Hayes was thrust into the center of the interior line. "Today's attack is about the inside line. Amare (Stodameyer) pulled up high to give Chuck plenty of space to attack. Chauncey (Billups) and Kobe Bryant were in a triangle with Chuck on the outside, and LeBron (James) was waiting for an opportunity to break through from the center to the inside. ”

In order to better break the combined defense of the Greek team, the Dream 8 team removed the starting center Dwight Howard in the first two games, and made Stadameyer, who has a strong mid-range shooting ability, the starting center.

"Chuck, it's up to you how many points we can win in this game." Coach K said to Hayes: "If they don't wrap up, you can attack casually." ”

"No one in the Greek team can stop me." Hayes smiled confidently. He was still a little more modest, because he had long thought in his heart that no one in this world could defend him one-on-one.

In the first two games, Hayes scored only 26 points in total, but played only 22 minutes in each game, and was more about attacking the offense. Playing against the U.S. team is easier than the Bobcats' usual practice matches.

On the other side, Greek head coach Giannakis said: "You have to slow down the pace in the attack, be fast when you return to the defense, and you can't let the U.S. team play fast offense." Only by falling into positional battles and defending the joint defense can we have the possibility of winning. Andres (Giligna Dakis), you have to pay attention to Hayes's low post offense on the inside, although he is only 198cm tall, but he is much better than Howard on the inside. ”

Giannakis is very concerned about Hayes' attack, and their power forward Fortesis is only 99kg tall despite being 208cm, making it difficult to defend against Hayes. So he arranged for Gelinia Dakis, who is 216cm tall, to defend, and if Hayes pulled out the perimeter, he let Fortesis follow.

To fight the United States, Greece is to set up an iron formation. Although Giannakis is the No. 2 leading scorer in Greek history, he has worked hard to build an impregnable defensive system since taking over the team. Those accusations of "ugly play", Iannakis will not care at all, because he knows that as long as the Greek team can win, all voices will disappear immediately.

U.S. starting lineup: Billups, Kobe, James, Hayes, Stoudamire.

Greece starting line-up: Diamantitis, Spanoulis, Fortesis, Giliña Dakis, Vaslopoulos.

Watching Stoudeyer play, Giannakis immediately realized that the U.S. team was going to strengthen its offense and break the defense.

The game began, and although Stoudamire was at a height disadvantage, he relied on his excellent bouncing power to win with the jump ball, and the Dream 8 team attacked first.

Billups slowly took the ball across the half court and handed it to Bryant on the left, and Billups ran to the left baseline. Bryant took a step forward and raised the ball to Hayes, who was standing one meter outside the three-second zone at a 45-degree angle.

Gelinia Dakis held off Hayes.

Let such a tall person defend me, the Greeks really look up to me. But how fast can you go? Hayes thought to himself, took a step with his back to his opponent, shook his shoulder to the left, and quickly turned to the basket. His physical fitness is in the middle and bottom of the NBA, but when it comes to the international arena, he has an advantage. Hayes stepped past Girenia Dakis, took the ball with both hands, stepped under the basket again, and smashed the ball with both hands! 2 to 0.

The U.S. team took the lead. Greece attacked, and the U.S. team began to press forward, and Hayes followed up with No. 9 Fortesis.

Although he was much shorter than his opponent, Hayes found it easy to defend. Because Fortesi's strength is too poor and his speed is not fast, he can't get rid of him and squeeze in, and as a power forward, he can only dangle on the outside.

Fortes also played in the NBA, he was drafted by the Memphis Grizzlies with the 48th pick in the second round in 2001, and played 28 games with 3.9 points and 2.2 boards in the NBA in the 2001-2002 season. Fortesis has a very good hand, shooting accurately from 18 feet, making wrong free throws, and has range to cover the three-point line. But with Hayes' defense, he struggled to connect the ball.

Just to be in the position, Fortesis was hit by Hayes and uncomfortable. After watching the game video before the game, Fortesis only felt that although Hayes was fierce, he was not unable to fight, and he volunteered to defend Hayes. Now he is glad that the coach did not arrange it that way, otherwise he would have died.

Spanoulis broke through with Fortese's high screen, and Hayes immediately switched guards to keep up with the former teammate.

Spanoolis stepped down to change hands, then broke through in disguise. If it's someone else who defends him, it's probably going to be by speed. But Hayes has been practicing with the national team for a while, and when he has nothing to do, he finds Wade, Paul, and Delon, the fastest guys, and has a new experience in defending breakthroughs.

As long as the opponent's center of gravity is not forward, no matter how realistic the feint is, it is impossible to break through, and the purpose of the feint is to change the defender's center of gravity. Hayes's reaction speed is unusually human, and he takes advantage of this trait, keeping his center of gravity still until the opponent moves forward, and only changes direction after determining the opponent's intentions. The advantage of reaction speed allows him to almost always block the opponent's breakthrough route.

Hayes' improvement on the perimeter was terrifying for Wade, Paul and other breakaways. Not to mention Span Nuoris, who can't even adapt to the NBA?

Hayes' right hand reached into Spanolys's dribble and slapped the ball down. As soon as James saw it, he immediately ran to the Greek basket.

Hayes took a step forward, got the basketball and turned to jump and threw it out with a big windmill dunk.

If it is an ordinary person, this kind of ball may not be received, but it is James who is fast attacking, he grabbed the basketball with one hand in an awkward posture, and took the ball and took two steps to dunk it! 4 to 0.

(To be continued)