April 24.

The first game of the first round of the playoffs between the Thunder and the Trail Blazers will officially start at the Ford Center Arena today.

Before this round of series started, the Thunder undoubtedly had the upper hand in the outside world's reputation.

After all, the Thunder has achieved the best record in the league with 67 wins and 15 losses this season, so there are naturally more fans who are optimistic that the Thunder can advance to the next round.

Speaking of which, the Trail Blazers this season are destined to be unlucky. During the offseason, they held several major transaction negotiations, but they all returned in vain.

Later, Teglu, who had basically negotiated the details of the contract, played the Trail Blazers without any suspense, and this time it could be said that he directly hit the Trail Blazers' old waist.

Fortunately, before the trading market closed, the Trail Blazers unexpectedly reached a deal with the Sixers, which brought an excellent point guard Andre Miller and signed him a three-year contract.

This is to stop the bleeding in time for the Trail Blazers, otherwise the Trail Blazers this year will definitely have a bloody collapse.

However, after entering the regular season, the Trail Blazers' luck was still not very friendly. The talented center Oden, who has been entrusted with the team, has been reimbursed as always in the season, and has only played a pitiful 21 games in the whole season.

In addition, Pulpzbila, who had previously replaced Oden as the starting center, also suffered injuries.

So in this case, the Trail Blazers' inside line once fell into a state of no one available, and could only be supported by power forward Aldridge alone.

But as an offensive and shooting power forward, Aldridge has never been his strength in defending the penalty area. At least with Aldridge's defensive ability, it is far from enough to support a team's inside line.

It was in this case that the Trail Blazers took a lot of risks to trade in the late season. They just hoped that he could help the team go further in the playoffs, or to help the team make the playoffs.

However, although Marcus Camby's airborne can temporarily replace the Blazers' defensive vacancy, the price paid by Marcus Camby to trade is to weaken the entire lineup rotation of the Trail Blazers.

This situation is obviously a taboo for a playoff team.

It's just a pity that the Trail Blazers have no choice. Otherwise, if there was no center forward who could guard the penalty area in this era, the team would definitely not be able to go further.

Before the game started, Yang Fan did not put pressure on the players, but instead just chatted with a few symbolic words, and then asked the players to warm up on the court.

After all, the Thunder team has the upper hand in this round of series without any suspense. As long as the Thunder can play steadily and show the strength in the regular season, it will not be difficult to win this round of series.

In this game, the starting lineups of the two teams are:

pioneer:

Andre Miller, Roy, Webster, Aldridge, and Camby.

Thunder:

Curry, "Martial Saint" Jackson, Durant, Jamison, and O'Neal.

In this game, Yang Fan and McMillan continued their regular lineups respectively and did not make any adjustments in starting.

If Yang Fan has been using this set of starting players because the running-in is enough, then McMillan can only be said to be helpless when using this set of starting players.

Because the depth of the entire Trail Blazers lineup can be said to be cut, the Trail Blazers' starting lineup is now the strongest lineup that McMillan can come up with.

After the game started, the Thunder still performed a lot of unball pick-and-rolls and screens like the regular season to help the shooter run out of more open spaces and make three-pointers from the outside.

In addition, Yang Fan really attacked the Trail Blazers' inside line in this game, that is, O'Neal and Curry stood on the strong side, and the other three stood on the weak side, forming a two-three-separated position.

In this way, with Curry opening up space for O'Neal, O'Neal can play Marcus Camby one-on-one singles at the basket.

Once the Trail Blazers double-team, at the speed of Curry's attack, as long as he seizes a slight opportunity, he can easily kill on the outside.

In fact, this set of positions is similar to Zen Master Jackson's triangular attack, except that Yang Fan omitted a lot of empty cuts and covers.

It is clear that Curry is used to restrain him and then let O'Neal go to the basket to play singles. As long as the Trail Blazers do not double-team, this is a showdown between a 1V1 at the basket.

Simply put, this is a tactic specially formulated for the "Big Shark" O'Neal, and it was a very common and common center singles tactic in the 1990s.

For the Thunder, in fact, in the regular season, Yang Fan rarely lets O'Neal ask the ball to play singles at the basket.

After all, O'Neal is already quite old and has some injuries, so Yang Fan has always been conservative in the regular season.

However, after entering the playoffs, Yang Fan no longer needs to have any reservations. As long as the Trail Blazers' defensive flaws are found, all Yang Fan needs to do is to target them with all his life.

The Trail Blazers' inside center is Marcus Camby, a center who just won the best defensive player in the first two seasons.

In theory, Cambi should be a guarantee for the Trail Blazers to guard the restricted area, and at least it will not fall into being targeted by others no matter what.

But Yang Fan knew that Camby was a perfect data brush, and his best defensive player had a lot of moisture.

What's more, Marcus Camby's strongest thing is to assist in defense, and he weighs only 107 kilograms, so he is undoubtedly as thin as a bamboo pole in the center position.

And when O'Neal asked for a single against him at the basket, the scene looked even more funny.

A fat as a pig, and a thin as a monkey, Camby had no ability to resist at all when O'Neal crushed the inside with his back.

The whole person could only reach out while pushing his hands, trying to disrupt O'Neal's offensive rhythm.

But as one of the best center players in NBA history, O'Neal has seen too many defensive methods in his career.

In other words, even if O'Neal is no longer at the peak, Marcus Camby is just a jumping clown in O'Neal's opinion.

As O'Neal wanted the ball at the basket and played singles again and again, Camby's defense was simply blown into a sieve. The entire Trail Blazers' inside line seemed to be O'Neal's back garden, basically leaving as soon as he wanted to come.

Faced with this situation, the Trail Blazers fans are undoubtedly very angry, because in the late season, the Trail Blazers spent a lot of money to trade for Marcus Cambi, hoping that he could bring some protection to the Trail Blazers' penalty area.

After all, Cambi is the best defensive player in the previous few seasons, and his average number of blocks per game this season has reached 2.1.

Who would have thought that as soon as the playoffs began, Camby was pressed to the ground by the "Big Shark" O'Neal and rubbed wildly.

You know, O'Neal is already 38 years old this year, and although Camby is 36 years old, he is still two years younger than O'Neal.

The result..., that's it???
Chapter completed!