NBA: This flower path is a bit strong

This person is none other than head coach Nelson.

In the post-match interview, Nelson put the blame for the loss on himself:

"We were not well prepared for this game, and I didn't take our opponent seriously, which led to our loss in the end."

His words surprised everyone present, because few coaches would admit their mistakes so frankly.

"As a professional coach, I should be highly vigilant for every game. However, today I made a fatal mistake. I didn't take our opponent seriously enough and didn't make adequate preparations."

Nelson continued, "The Knicks have the best players in the league, so I want to apologize to my players and to all the fans who support our team."

Despite the loss, Nelson's honesty and responsibility are impressive.

In fact, throughout the game, Nelson faced the [run and gun tactics] that he was good at using the Raptors coach. It was not that he couldn't come up with a response, but that he knew that under the circumstances, the team's core inside players would not cooperate with him at all!

No matter how good the strategy and tactics are, they still need players to implement them. Old Nelson, who has experienced a crisis in player relations, understands this truth better than anyone else.

But after today's defeat, I believe the situation will be different.

Therefore, at the end of the interview, Old Nelson mysteriously expressed that he had found a way to deal with the Raptors and made a promise to keep the next home advantage.

The local media let the Knicks, who should have been criticized, go!

Although the experienced Old Nelson took the blame and withstood the pressure from the outside world on the team.

But in the eyes of most New York fans, they still have doubts about the Knicks.

This is New York. If you love a player, send him to the holy land of New York, because he will enjoy the most eye-catching and dazzling lights in the world after winning; but if you hate a player, you can also send him to New York, because he will be criticized and scolded the most in the NBA league after losing.

Shaquille O'Neal scored 33 points and 11 rebounds in the game, which lived up to the expectations of the ESPN commentator and many Knicks fans before the game.

Since it was not O'Neal's problem, the problem could only be Patrick Ewing, the core of the team!

Patrick Ewing scored 17 points, 8 rebounds and 2 assists in the game, which was completely below standard!

This was both expected and unexpected by the New Yorkers.

It was expected because Ewing had a history of being soft at the critical moment of the playoffs; it was unexpected that he did not expect to be so soft so quickly in this playoffs!

So, after the game on May 6, until the second series against the Raptors on May 11.

Ewing's life was not easy. In the end, after Nelson said "Everything for the O'Brien Cup", [Gorilla] gave up the act of being angry with [Shark], accepted the advice of head coach Nelson, and chose to deal with the inside player who was not the core of the opposing team~former teammate Charles Oakley.

Now, the method that old Nelson said to deal with the Raptors is finally guaranteed.

Stable inside twin towers ~ each doing their own job in the ground battle, focusing on a success rate.

Old Nelson knows very well that as long as the Knicks' own rhythm is guaranteed, playing slow and fast, they will not be led by the nose by the Raptors.

Facts have proved that under the condition of ensuring offensive and defensive efficiency and rebounds, the ground battle is the only magic weapon to fight against the run-and-gun style!

Old Nelson, who is well versed in the run-and-gun style, certainly understands this best.

Therefore, after Ewing agreed to the proposal to switch defense, old Nelson was not worried that his team, whose overall strength was already above the Raptors, would lose again.

In the next few days, old Nelson also specially strengthened the team's targeted training, specifically interfered with the Raptors' fast break passes after grabbing the backcourt rebounds, and sent special personnel to interfere with the Raptors' baseline serve to prevent the Knicks from being beaten into a fast break again.

The so-called old ginger is still spicy!

Just as Nelson predicted, the Knicks won the second series against the Raptors on May 11.

Although Hanamichi faced O'Neal's offense and defense, he still scored 23 points, 15 rebounds, 3 blocks and 5 assists.

But the opposing twin towers scored 25+ points, especially Ewing, who played against his old teammate Charles Oakley. This time he showed his power and scored 27 points in the whole game, which was a loud slap in the face of the media's doubts:

He Ewing is still the dominant [super giant]!

The most important thing is that in this game, the Raptors' multiple counterattacks and fast breaks were destroyed by the New York Knicks.

In the Knicks' slow positional offense, the entire Raptors players were like tied to sandbags, and their hands and feet were tied.

In terms of the core of the Raptors, the team's engine~Space Squirrel~Damon Stoudemire felt the rhythm the most. In the last game, the Knicks unconsciously followed the Raptors to play a fast pace, but in this game, the Knicks' offensive time was generally extended, and sometimes an offense would even take up 24 seconds.

The opposing guards strengthened their defense and focused on cutting off their inside and outside fast break passing routes, which made him very uncomfortable.

And Hanamichi faced this very serious fact for the first time, that is, he could not defend O'Neal.

Even if his physical strength was better than O'Neal, he could not take much advantage.

Before he gained weight, O'Neal was also a big guy with strong athletic ability and decent physical fitness.

In addition to his stronger body, Hanamichi would even spend more energy defending him, even if he failed.

The Knicks' slow position adjustment also gave the "Shark", who was exhausted in the last game, a chance to breathe this time, without wasting too much energy on the shuttle run, so he played more easily on the offensive end.

Of course, it is also true that O'Neal is not very good at defending Hanamichi, who has a variety of offensive methods.

He formed a mutual explosion with two of the four centers, and even restricted one of them very well, which is enough for Hanamichi to be proud of.

As reported by the Toronto media, the team lost but Hanamichi did not.

But now the question Hanamichi is considering is how to lead the team to victory!

As a freshman, he led the team into the playoffs and broke through the first round as the core, which is already a very good result, but for the single-celled Hanamichi, this is far from enough.

So in the third home game of the series, Hanamichi found Ewing on the offensive end, scored 20 points efficiently and sent out 8 outrageous assists, which were regarded as heresy by the inside players of this era.

Assists were not Hanamichi's purpose, because in this game Hanamichi suddenly found that O'Neal, who was "black and hard", was actually helping Ewing to defend on his own initiative.

Being able to attract the two inside cores of the Knicks in one fell swoop, Hanamichi didn't know whether to be proud of Alexander or Alexander.

In short, even if Hanamichi created opportunities for his teammates and sent out 8 assists, the Raptors still lost to the Knicks 89:94.

The big score of the series became 2:1. If the Raptors lost another game, they would be on the road to the end of this playoffs.

But it is obvious that facing the New York Knicks who firmly control the inside and the commanding power, the Raptors will not be able to come up with any countermeasures for a while.

Even in the fourth game on May 12, the head coach of the Raptors launched the meat shield tactic to consume O'Neal's physical energy from the beginning, but under the reasonable allocation of players' playing time by old Nelson, O'Neal and Ewing still scored 55 points together.

This time, the Raptors were completely pushed to the edge of the cliff!