The NBA entered the new century, and the most typical case of choosing an opponent was when the King deliberately fell to sixth in 2005, specifically challenging the dark horse supersonics that season, but was swept by the supersonics 4-1 gentleman, and Adelman was disgraced.

Another time, the Jazz deliberately lost and fell to fifth place. They would rather give up their home advantage than to play against the Rockets who were injured and reimbursed by Yao Ming. In the end, they successfully advanced, but they were easily eliminated by the Lakers 4-2 in the second round, which had no decisive effect.

As for the Mavericks' misfortune in the first round, they were not actually choosing opponents, but rather letting old Nelson enter the playoffs. However, they did not expect that old Nelson led a group of bandits to rush around, and were quite familiar with Nowitzki's shortcomings on both offense and defense.

"I also think the Trail Blazers are better against it," assistant coach Brooks continued. "In addition, letting the Spurs consume the Lakers or Mavericks in the first round will also be more beneficial to our subsequent schedule, especially to observe the Lakers' offensive and defensive strategies."

After Brooks said that, assistant coach Mark nodded: "Don't worry about media ridicule, the result is the most important."

It is obvious that compared to the experienced Spurs, which have no shortcomings, the Trail Blazers' more goal-oriented lineup will be easier to deal with. Moreover, the Spurs' record this season is mainly because Parker is absent from 26 games and his playing style is also changing significantly.

Everyone talked about the three major illusions of Texas - the Spurs are too old, but few teams are willing to play against the Spurs in the first round.

There is no way, the Spurs are too experienced, and even if they finally defeat the Spurs, they will have to pay a relatively high price.

Seeing that three of the four assistant coaches prefer to play against the Trail Blazers in the first round, Su Yang looked at Snyder with his eyes signaled his opinion.

Snyder pondered for a while: "I also support controlling the six, seven, and eight rankings, and selecting the Trail Blazers as the first round opponent, but I know you have never cared about the media's opinions. Are you worried about the lack of training in the first round of the players?"

Su Yang thought to himself that Snyder knew him. Legendary coaches like Adelman and Sloan would choose opponents, and he would not worry about what the media said. The key is that he was worried that the players would be lucky and always wanted to win.

"I want to establish a mentality for the players, even when facing the strongest Lakers, we can win." Su Yang made up his mind, "Avoid the players instinctively feel that it is difficult to play when they face the Lakers. Our goal is to win the championship."

The four assistants nodded silently to agree. When it comes to that, talking about other options has no effect.

The topic immediately shifted to the last few games, how should we implement the established plan so that the players can experience the playoffs in advance.

After the discussion, Su Yang took the initiative to contact the official website reporter Nick Garno to tell in detail the process of the coaching team's decision to give up controlling the ranking. He hoped that the Nick would compile it into a news report and post it on the official website and Twitter to announce his determination to win the championship to the Thunder fans.

With a fearless challenge mentality, the Thunder team flew to Salt Lake City to challenge the Jazz away.

Perhaps he wanted to rank sixth and avoid the first round of the playoffs against the Thunder or the Lakers, the Jazz played very hard at the beginning, especially Deron, who dragged his larger weight and chased Westbrook like he was tirelessly trying to fight.

However, Thunder responded easily, and Su Yang also intended to let Westbrook suppress the rhythm and experience patiently responding to the challenges.

After the first quarter, the Jazz led the three-pointers with more frontcourt rebounds and also made more fouls.

However, the second quarter entered the substitute stage, and Harden quickly led the team to tie the team and overtook the Jazz by five points.

After returning from the break at halftime, the tough Jazz frantically looked for physical confrontation, and the referee also relaxed the standards. Su Yang encouraged the Thunder generals to fight and fully experience the large number of positional battles and rapid offensive and defensive transitions in the playoffs, especially the attitude of fighting for every goal.

The two teams are back and forth, and the young man of Thunder is obviously at a disadvantage. Fortunately, Durant resists the heavy pressure and regains his feel.

The game was delayed until the last eight seconds of the fourth quarter. Su Yang arranged the tactics by Jeff Green to tie the three-pointer, and then arranged the exquisite defense, allowing the Jazz to shoot continuously, successfully substituting the game into overtime, and then temporarily adjusting the strategy to play around Harden.

The offensive and defensive tactics have changed frequently, and the young people of the Thunder can always execute efficiently with two seasons of accumulation.

In the last moment of overtime, Harden asked Durant to play a pick-and-roll, broke through and rushed toss, and narrowly defeated the Jazz with one point.

In the whole game, Durant scored 45 points, which was another high-intensity battle that successfully resisted the pressure.

ESPN then tweeted, claiming that the Thunder's record reached 65 wins and 12 losses this season, breaking the team's best regular season win record, including the Supersonics, but legendary Gary Payton retweeted Twitter, saying that the Thunder had nothing to do with the Supersonics.

That night, the Thunder team set off overnight to the Denver Plateau to challenge the Nuggets back-to-back away.

Considering that he has already locked in the league first and was exhausted before, Su Yang found a reason to let Durant and Chandler quit, simulate the main players in the playoffs being troubled by fouls, reduce Westbrook's time to play, and let Harden lead the team more.

After the game, Harden scored 33 points and 11 assists, but unfortunately he lost to the Nuggets by a four-point gap.

After a day off, the Thunder will play against the Suns at home.

Because he wanted to compete with the Mavericks for the third place in the Western Conference, the Suns went all out at the beginning, which was considered to be the playoffs.

Unfortunately, because the Suns strictly implemented the V-shaped offensive system, they couldn't retreat and defend. The Thunder frequently relied on Westbrook and Harden to make a counterattack. Although they were only one point ahead in the first quarter, they directly opened up a 10-point gap in the second quarter.

After returning from the break at halftime, the Thunder also maintained a suppressed rhythm, and Xiao Si played for 12 consecutive minutes and could not reverse it.

After the whole game, he won 106-96. Westbrook efficiently won a large triple-double, which was so strong that it was explosive.

On April 11, the Thunder flew to Auckland to play against the Warriors, and Su Yang rewarded the players to fight casually to relax their nerves.

Harden competed with Mageti with a challenging mentality, but ended up leaving the field with six fouls, and was still too young. Fortunately, Durant scored 40 points, Westbrook scored 20 points and 10 assists, and easily led Harden to win.

After playing against the Warriors, the Thunder flew to Portland overnight, facing the Trail Blazers back to back, and finally lost to three-pointers.

Su Yang really didn't let go, mainly because the Trail Blazers were unwilling to face the Thunder in the first round of the playoffs, and their playing style was very fierce. McMillan also boldly used Fernandez as the starting shooting guard, and the 8-player was rotated in the game, fighting in a bloody battle.

That kind of playing style was used as soon as the game started. Durant and other main players underestimated the enemy and were not prepared, and they made too many mistakes and dug too big holes.

On the plane back to Oklahoma, Su Yang first reviewed himself and said that he did not remind everyone, which caused everyone to have not escaped from the casual playing state against the Warriors. Then he criticized Durant and his men for not despising their opponents, and Durant and his men promised not to commit again.

In the last game of the season, the Thunder faced the Grizzlies at Ford Center, most of the time they came on as a substitute and narrowly won by six points.

On the same night, the Jazz, Trail Blazers and Spurs all lost, and the rankings of the three teams remained unchanged.

The top five in the West were also released, with the Thunder first, the Lakers second, the Mavericks third, the Suns fourth, and the Nuggets fifth.

The first round of the Western Conference match was confirmed, and the bookmakers offered relevant odds, and they were very optimistic about the Spurs Black Eight Thunder.

Many media forwarded it one after another to express their agreement, mainly because the two teams in the regular season were playing against each other, and the Spurs won more than they lost. The situation was a bit like the Mavericks' regular season 0-3, and the Warriors were targeted by the Warriors in the playoffs, not to mention that the Spurs were more than the eighth level.
Chapter completed!