CHAPTER 1314: CHAPTER 416: THE MOST WRONG DECISION

The whole team is full of fighting spirit and incredibly resilient. They have a strong leader. Their role players can always step up, winning victories in adversity with a seemingly not-so-powerful lineup.

For Bay Area fans, it’s been a dream-like season. Before it began, no one expected the Golden State Warriors, lacking their second-best player, to come this far. And now, as the Warriors face the mighty Spurs in the playoffs, the dream continues.

The miracle anticipated by fans and media is getting closer to becoming reality.

Bill Simmons bluntly stated on his blog: "If the champion this season is not the Warriors, it will be one of the greatest tragedies in NBA history."

After this game, Gregg Popovich has a new understanding of the Warriors’ strength this season.

This team maybe lacks a second star, but it possesses an unfathomable depth of rotation.

The Warriors do not have a legitimate second star to elevate the team’s ceiling, but they have a bunch of outstanding role players who can uphold the team’s baseline.

Yes, the Warriors’ role players can’t all be in peak form every night. But similarly, the Warriors’ role players won’t all be out of form in any given game.

If one can’t do it, another one will step up. Each of them has a strong desire to win, making any of them a potential X factor in a game.

For the Spurs, this is the real challenge.

Most teams meeting in the playoffs are essentially playing open cards. Both sides know each other very well, allowing for targeted strategies.

But this conventional approach to basketball is ineffective against the Warriors.

You can’t target the Golden State Warriors.

Perhaps tonight you can leave Boris Diaw open, but tomorrow he might kill you from the three-point line.

You never know who will step up next.

Fortunately, in Game 2 of the series, the ones who stepped up were Spurs players.

In Game 2, the San Antonio Spurs continued to employ the strategy of doubling Roger, and they were even more determined than the last game.

Although Roger can still score off the ball, the output with off-ball plays is ultimately limited. Unless you have a peak Klay Thompson, who can shoot from any position when hot, the output ceiling for off-ball plays is very low.

And even for Klay, it’s only in certain games with a burst of shooting form that he can carry a game. Everyone knows that the true core of that Golden State Warriors team is the Slam Dunk King.

Great defense is nothing more than forcing the opponent to reduce effectiveness or production. It’s often not easy to simultaneously contain a top star’s efficiency and production. Instead of defense, making a star both ineffective and unproductive often depends on the star underperforming themselves.

So for the Spurs, as long as they can contain either Roger’s efficiency or production, the defense is considered successful.

Now, the Spurs have suppressed Roger’s production, forcing him to play off the ball, at least preventing him from easily scoring 40+ points in a single game.

However, determined double-teaming also made the Spurs pay other costs, such as allowing Jason Richardson to hit 6 out of 8 from the three-point line.

This guy, who paid 100,000 US Dollars out of his own pocket to publish an apology letter in major Bay Area newspapers, this guy who’d rather give up higher positions offered by other teams to stay by Roger’s side and help him build a dynasty, knows he must shoulder his mission.

So today, he scored 31 points throughout the game, playing like Bay Area’s own Vince Carter.

But unfortunately, since 1994, Robert Horry, who has been entangled with Roger in the finals, once again becomes an obstacle on Roger’s path to victory.

Robert Horry is like a monk sweeping the floor. The league’s struggles seem unrelated to him, and most of the time, fans won’t remember such a character.

But if you look closely at his resume, you’ll find that from 1992 to now, in 14 years, he almost appeared in all the major nodes affecting the League’s history.

In the mid-’90s, he and the Houston Rockets took the last championship before the Roger era arrived.

In the early 2000s, he and the OK combination became Roger’s biggest challengers.

Now, he is wearing the black-silver jersey, trying to stop the establishment of the Bay Area dynasty.

He might be the only one in the League who has been battling with Roger from his rookie season until now.

In the key moment of this game, when even the elusive dagger couldn’t work, Robert Horry, the monk sweeping the floor, put down his broom again.

seconds before the game ended, Manu Ginobili made a mistake that made Popovich shout from the sidelines, "I’ll trade him away!"

At that time, relying on his rich experience, Robert Horry successfully intercepted a pass from Diaw to Roger, though he couldn’t take control directly.

The basketball flew toward the midcourt line, Manu Ginobili chased after it, but was unexpectedly hit in the face by Matt Barnes, who also tried to control the ball. Although Matt Barnes indeed has a bad track record, this time he really didn’t mean to hit the opponent.

The referee also didn’t blow the whistle seeing this. To ensure the intensity of the game, the referee’s calls were lenient in the last moments of this series; in the last game, Raja Bell’s frantic jersey pulling while defending Roger off the ball wasn’t called.

Seeing a fast break opportunity, Ginobili, without hesitation, decided to continue chasing the ball.

Unexpectedly, Roger successfully overtook and regained the ball, while Ginobili, quick-witted, after being hit in the face, suddenly covered his face wanting a whistle even though he had already run several steps away. Because of this, he didn’t immediately go back on defense, allowing Matt Barnes to easily hit an open three-pointer.