Chapter 317: Quiet American Airlines Center
"6:0, Sickle's defense and passing are too critical! Although he didn't choose to confront LeBron today, the Knicks today are more relaxed and clear, and they didn't match up with James. It seems that after losing to the Miami Heat a few days ago, Sickle also made a lot of preparations for this game!"
James shook his head, the Knicks are excellent on both offense and defense! Many people say that the team led by D'Antoni can only attack and not defend, but this season the Knicks are called an impregnable wall!
The most important thing is that as long as Lian Dao is there, the Knicks' perimeter will not lose their deterrent power on the offensive end!
In the next few rounds, the Heat still struggled very much.
A few minutes later, the score came to 16:7, and the Knicks still maintained their lead.
Wade played well against the Knicks before, and he had no chance to be defended by Tony Allen; not to mention James, who has not matured technically, faced Lian Dao's defense, and his shooting percentage was even worse.
The Miami Heat's 7 points all came from Bosh. Millsap's height once again became a weak point in the face of Bosh's flexible offense.
The cheers at the American Airlines Center arena went from deafening before the opening, to weak refueling after the opening, and now the audience is silent.
The confidence of the Miami fans is being stifled a little bit.
Many Miami fans shook their heads at the performance of the Heat. They probably regretted spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy such a worthless ticket! After all, walking out of the player's tunnel is a luxury bar. If you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in a bar, it will be happier than buying a ticket!
Seeing that the score gap was about to move towards double digits, seeing this situation, the Heat's Filipino coach Eric Spoelstra called a timeout.
In the first quarter of the game, he fell into a passive position, which Spoelstra never expected.
"Don't be surprised when you see D'Antoni's team create trouble for opponents through defense! If you have so many defensive fighters under your hands, believe me, you can also become a defensive master among coaches! "Jeff Van Gundy is too envious of D'Antoni, why didn't he have so many talented players when he was coaching.
"The Knicks' defense has indeed caused a lot of trouble for the Heat! The Heat's offense is extremely difficult under the Knicks' defense. The most important thing is that they are often exhausted in the Knicks' defensive counterattack. Perhaps, before the start of the game , the Heat have underestimated the Knicks with the league's first record."
Mike Breen was right. The Heat didn't take the Knicks seriously before the game. Not only James, Wade and Bosh also didn't take the Knicks too seriously.
At this time, D'Antoni also changed his usual offensive-first style, and the tactics he arranged for the players were.
"Continue to strengthen the defense and don't give them the slightest chance to breathe!"
In the previous game against the Heat, D'Antoni used a full-scale offensive tactic, and the result was a disastrous defeat.
Although D'Antoni is an offensive coach, he is not an egomaniac.
During the resumption later, Lian Dao also put forward his own ideas. This time D'Antoni did not insist on his idea of putting offense first. He knew that the Knicks would never go far without Lian Dao, because in the game against the Cavaliers, The Knicks were on a break, and the Knicks lost to this Eastern team.
After that, the Knicks fell into doubts from the media.
However, the loss to the Cavaliers also made D'Antoni understand that if the Knicks did not have cheap rice, their best result is probably the first round of the playoffs.
And this is obviously dissatisfied for D'Antoni, who is eager for a championship to prove his coaching ability, so he began to compromise psychologically with defense.
Of course, it's better to say that he compromised with the championship than he compromised with defense.
Lately, defensive coach Mike Woodson has had an easier time.
When the goals are consistent, all contradictions will naturally disappear.
After returning from the timeout, the Heat attacked for the first time.
James used a counter-run and his teammates off-ball pick-and-roll to get rid of Lian Dao's defense. Then Wade threw it just right inside, and James jumped inside to catch the ball and dunk.
This is the first time Zhan Wei's connection has been completed in this game.
The Heat fans at the scene immediately cheered, when everyone, including the Heat's head coach, thought that this would be the beginning of the Heat's counterattack.
However, the pace of the game did not go in the direction American Airlines Center fans hoped.
After that, under the Knicks' oppressive defense, the Heat once again fell into a vicious circle of turnovers.
The Heat knew that there were not many opportunities from the outside, so they were given the ball to the inside.
Bosh held the ball with his back, but this time the player defending him was not Millsap, but Cousins. Bosh didn't pay attention to this rookie, and still used Millsap to deal with Cousins.
As a result, when turning around, the basketball was directly cut off by Cousins.
After that, Bosh's two consecutive offenses were restricted by Cousins, who was flexible and physically gifted.
And James had to forcefully break through Lian Dao again, but was intercepted by Lian Dao during the confrontation.
Wade connected with James for the second time, but Lian Dao, who had suffered a loss once, jumped high and intercepted the pass in the air.
Janeway's connection was destroyed again!
Lian Dao, who destroyed the Heat's offense one after another, became a thorn in the side of Heat fans at the American Airlines Center.
After some operations, the first quarter ended. The Knicks exceeded everyone's expectations, leading the Heat by 14 points at 32:18!
The audience fell into dead silence again. The fans in Miami couldn't imagine that the Heat could easily beat the Knicks in the away game before, why they were restricted so badly after coming to the home court.
They really didn't know that it was the Heat's problem, and the Knicks' strength had greatly increased in a short period of time.
Especially Wade, who played well in previous games, in this game, at the end of the first quarter, Wade did not score a single point.
Not only that, but under the defense of Tony Allen, he even got 3 turnovers in the first quarter.
James is still restricted by Lian Dao in this game. So far, he has only made 2 of 5 shots, scored 4 points, and made two turnovers.
The only player who played well was Dragon King Bosh, who scored 11 points and 4 rebounds in the first quarter.
After coming back from a timeout in the first quarter, he only hit a goal under the defense of Cousins Two of the points were fouled by Cousins during a layup and got free throws.
On the other hand, for the Knicks, Lian Dao scored 12 points, 3 assists, 3 rebounds and 3 steals in the first quarter. One of these three steals came from James, and two came from Wade's pass.
It can be said that in the comparison of the data in the first quarter, Lian Dao almost blown James off.
Now, the fans at the American Airlines Center are completely awake. The Knicks' previous loss was really an accident. Today's performance of the Knicks may be their true strength.
"Fack, what the hell, the Celtics gave away their No. 42 Tony Allen's Celtics jersey number to the New Yorkers for nothing!" Wade couldn't help yelling after he left the field. Allen was very embarrassed.
The most important thing is that he missed the ball under the defense of Tony Allen, but he still made mistakes again and again.
This time, neither James nor Wade felt that Tony Allen was an unknown person. Before Tony Allen was in the Celtics, he could only play as Ray Allen's substitute. Jun met, and rarely faced Tony Allen.
Therefore, it is normal for them not to know Tony Allen's defensive strength.
"Recover well, we may be in trouble!" James patted Wade on the shoulder.
Although the Heat are lagging behind, James still doesn't question Wade's ability. He also trusts Wade very much. If he doesn't trust Wade, he should have chosen Chicago instead of Miami.
The 14-point difference is actually not that big of a difference. Wade believes that after adapting to Tony Allen's defensive intensity in the first quarter, he should improve in the second quarter.
But at this time, a text message that Anthony sent to him yesterday flashed through Wade's mind.