On the court, the first playoff game between the Hornets and Lakers is in full swing.

Paul holds the ball on the outside and faces the defense of Tony Allen, Wang Meng is in line with Kobe Bryant because his height is the same, so he and Kobe are now marking each other.

Tony Allen's defense is very aggressive, just sticking to Paul, not giving Paul a chance to shoot, and even the passing route is blocked a lot. However, Paul is a veritable second point guard in the league after all, and his strength is second only to Wang Meng in point guards.

The basketball that flew out from under Paul's crotch flew into Kobe's hands impartially, and then the momentum when receiving the ball, Kobe Bryant wiped into the Wasp's inner line in two steps, Wang Meng broke out instantly before he opened it, and he was thrown behind.

Kobe, who rushed into the interior, was not in a hurry to attack, but instead passed the basketball to the ground into the hands of Howard on the inside.

Howard received the basketball and found that Oden's defense was a little forward, and he directly turned around and scored a dunk over Oden.

"This is a triangular attack?!" Gasol, who was in charge of defending Kenyon Martin on the side, frowned slightly when he saw this. When this offense was launched, the positions of Paul, Kobe and Howard seemed to be a vague triangle. Gasol is the most important point of Phil Jackson's triangle offense in the Lakers, and sometimes it is even more important than Kobe, one of the important reasons for this is because Gasol is the central axis of Phil Jackson's triangle offense, and the excellent ball quotient makes it easy for Gasol to see the position of his teammates after holding the ball in the high post, so that he can choose to play alone or pass, which is also the most troublesome reason for the triangle offense.

Gasol, who knows the mystery of the triangle offense, saw this offense and immediately noticed the difference, this tactic is obviously a kind of triangle tactics, different from Gasol's triangle tactics during the Lakers period, the axis of this triangle tactic is Kobe Bryant as a scoring guard, Paul and Kobe Bryant two outside lines use passes to find gaps on the outside, and then pass the ball to Howard inside, so that Howard has enough time and preparation to play alone.

Interior offense tends to be the most efficient, and the closer you are to the basket, the more likely you are to hit the basket.

To be honest, in Gasol's view, the current Lakers' triangle tactics seem somewhat reluctant, compared to the triangle tactics when he was in the Lakers, it is undoubtedly a lot worse, of course, this is mainly because of the difference in players, the current Lakers, although there are excellent passers on the outside, but there is a lack of a big man who can organize on the inside. Howard, who has played one inside and four outside tactics in the Magic for so many years, has not improved his passing skills much, especially compared with players like Gasol, which is several streets worse. Therefore, Phil Jackson used Kobe Bryant and Paul to carry out the triangle tactics of outside and inside, and there was no way to do it.

That being said, the Lakers' triangle tactics are not much worse than before, these three players are too strong, and they can easily control the victory of the game with their strong individual ability alone, not to mention the tactics used by the three together?

However, although the Lakers are strong, the Hornets are obviously not easy to mess with, in the final analysis, Gasol's ability in response is much better than in offense, which also makes him an excellent fit for any tactic, the previous triangle tactics in the Lakers can be competent, and now the blocking and pick-and-roll tactics in the Hornets are also competent.

Wang Meng shouted outside to block and dismantle, Gasol immediately came up, helped Wang Meng block Kobe, and then immediately cut in the inside line, Wang Meng's basketball was just right to pass to Gasol's hands, Gasol held the ball in both hands and prepared to make a layup, Howard suddenly flew up like a big bird, wanting to give Gasol a big hat.

At this time, Gasol sent the basketball to Oden with one hand, and Oden, who received the basketball, pulled it up on the spot, and pulled the basket down a little with a dunk that pulled out the mountains and rivers.

Howard jumped in vain, but he didn't make any achievements, and couldn't help but return to the baseline to serve in frustration.

"Well done!" Oden and Gasol both high-fived, Oden's favorite in the team is Wang Meng and Gasol, even more like Roy who was on the same team as himself, no way, who let these two people assist themselves to score? Needless to say, Wang Meng always uses the breakthrough to create opportunities for himself to open the receiver or empty inside, and Gasol can also use some ways to pass the ball to himself.

Who doesn't want their stats to look a little better when they play on the field? Auden is no exception. His regular season stats are 15 points and 11 rebounds, and when the Hornets need the ball inside and outside, Oden can still get such data, which is related to the feeding of Wang Meng and Gasol. When it comes to feeding the ball, in fact, Oden's position at that time is often the best and closest to the basket.

In the first quarter, the game between the Hornets and the Lakers was extremely intense, Wang Meng and Kobe Bryant played abnormally under their respective tough defenses, Wang Meng shot 2 of 5, including 2 three-point shots and 0 shots, and only scored 6 points in the first quarter plus free throws, but Kobe Bryant was not much better, 8 points in a single quarter, although it seems to be two points higher than Wang Meng in terms of score, but Kobe Bryant is 8 shots and 3 hits, which is much worse than Wang Meng.

In the first quarter, it wasn't their luxurious outside lines that the two teams really fired, but the inside lines.

Gasol shot 3-of-3 from the field at 100 percent, plus four free throws, to score just 10 points in the first quarter, while the Lakers' Howard made seven shots inside, five of which were 2-of-3 free throws, temporarily scoring a team-high 12 points.

Soon, the substitutes from both teams came on the pitch.

Seeing this, Phil, who was sitting on the sidelines, finally frowned slightly, at this time, it was the situation he was most worried about in this series.

In order to form the Big Three, the Lakers basically traded all their excellent bench lineups, and the only one who can handle the current Lakers bench is Blake and Jamison. Looking at the Hornets' luxurious bench lineup, Phil Jackson knows that the difference between the two sides is about to widen......

Sure enough, under the leadership of Roy, the Hornets launched a wave of 12:2 attacks, and only Jamison threw in one mid-range shot in the entire Lakers team.

The Lakers fell behind by ten points, but Phil Jackson did not call a timeout, which surprised Monty very much, he was going to use Phil to make some personnel adjustments to the players on the court when he called a timeout, but he didn't expect Phil to call a timeout.

But think about it, Phil Jackson is also famous for calling timeouts weird and incomprehensible, sometimes, many people think that there is no need to call a timeout, he just calls a timeout, sometimes he should call a timeout, he just doesn't call a timeout.

Since Phil Jackson doesn't call a timeout, Monty is not in a hurry, anyway, it's the Lakers and not the Hornets who are behind the score difference now.

With that in mind, Monty sat on the sidelines, just waiting for the Lakers' timeout.

Soon, however, Monty became a little restless.

The Hornets' advantage continued, but Phil Jackson just didn't call a timeout, and as the minutes passed, Monty couldn't stand it anymore and took the initiative to call a timeout.

No way, Roy has too much time on the court, this is just the beginning of the second quarter of the game, plus the first quarter, Roy has been on the court for 13 minutes, which means that half of the playing time has been used up, in order to make a critical moment, Monty must keep Roy's playing time. Unfortunately, during this time, the two sides did not foul and make free throws, so they could only call a timeout for substitutions.

"Sure enough, I replaced Roy." Seeing this, a smile suddenly appeared on Phil's originally expressionless face, after all, after observing a season, Roy's current situation is not a secret to Phil Jackson, Roy only averages 25 minutes per game, which is much lower than the best sixth man of other teams, why can Roy only play 25 minutes? With Roy's excellent efficiency, playing 30 or even 35 minutes is not too much, right? The only explanation is that Roy's injury has not fully recovered.

So, take advantage of the team's temporary lag to cut the playing time of key players of the Hornets.

"That's a good deal!" Monty's face was bitter, but he didn't expect to be put on a stand by Phil Jackson unconsciously, what an old fox.

The Hornets' bench lineup is indeed strong, but this strength is based on Roy, the entire bench lineup, the only one who can attack with the ball is Roy, Fisher is old, Barnes Yi Jianlian and others are not enough, it can be said that the Hornets' bench offense is basically completed by Roy alone, and now Roy is off the field, in order to ensure offensive efficiency, the Hornets can only replace Wang Meng on the court to ensure the team's lead.

"Roy has to wait until it matters so much to get him on the pitch for the remaining 12 minutes of playing time!" Monty said secretly in his heart.

At this moment, halfway through the second quarter of the game, both sides have main players on the court, but there are not many, on the Hornets' side, on the court are Wang Meng and Wallace, who have just been replaced, and on the Lakers' side, Paul and Kenyon Martin also played.

Wang glanced at the score, quickly memorized it, and then took Yi Jianlian's serve.

At 39:21, the lead is now 8 points!

Wang Meng said secretly in his heart: "This score is obviously not enough for a strong team like the Lakers, so let's make the score difference bigger!" Just do it when you think of it, Wang Meng didn't say a word, and instantly opened an instant outburst.

Since Kobe Bryant was not on the court, the task of defending Wang Meng returned to Paul, Paul was just about to go up to defend Wang Meng, and suddenly found that Wang Meng moved, and the speed was extremely fast, before he could react, Wang Meng had already rushed past Paul, Paul only had time to use his body to block Wang Meng slightly, and was immediately knocked away by Wang Meng's fierce power.

(To be continued)