roccoschili Chapter 842 Fork in the Road
Chapter 842 Fork in the Road
The news that the New York Knicks beat the Toronto Raptors quickly came out.
Not only the eastern side was surprised, but the western side was also extremely surprised by this. The other two teams in the East, the first-ranked Milwaukee Bucks and the fifth-ranked Philadelphia 76ers, also soon played against each other.
In the first game of the semifinals, the Bucks performed well and defeated the 76ers with almost no effort.
Although Joel Embiid performed well in the first quarter, Antetokounmpo Giannis was too strong. He kept taking shots in the paint, fought against Embiid many times, and successfully entered the basket several times to hit hard.
In the first half, he carried the entire Bucks forward. In the second half, Bucks guard Brock Lopez broke out. The latter scored 29 points despite the interference of the Bucks. His performance even Better than Antetokounmpo.
In this way, the Bucks easily won the first game.
The games in the Western Conference are coming soon.
The Golden State Warriors faced the Portland Trail Blazers in the semifinals.
In this game, the Warriors defeated the Trail Blazers without much effort. Damian Lillard, the core player of the Trail Blazers, performed mediocrely and only scored 19 points.
His 19 points also became the highest on the team.
C.J. McCrum only scored 17 points, and only three others scored in double figures.
It can be said that the Trail Blazers' performance was extremely disappointing.
On the other hand, for the Warriors, the team's core Stephen Curry scored a game-high 36 points, and Klay Thompson scored the team's second-highest 26 points.
Other than that, only Draymond Green scored in double figures.
Although the performance of the role players is not much different from that of the Trail Blazers, the existence of the "Splash Brothers" has obviously supported the Warriors' lows.
It is worth mentioning that before the semifinals, Kevin Durant had a problem with his Achilles tendon.
Suffering from injuries, he could only choose to rest. Since the end of the first round of the playoffs, Durant has not appeared on the training ground. The Warriors have never officially expressed their position on this. No one knows when Durant will return. He can come back, but no one knows whether he will come back.
In short, until Durant is unable to play through injury, all the Warriors can do is rely on themselves.
Fortunately, as Green said, they were already the championship before Durant came to the Warriors! As a championship team, even if the super core is temporarily suspended due to injuries, the Warriors' original lineup is enough to cope with most teams in the league.
Obviously, the Trail Blazers are one of them.
The other two teams in the West are the Denver Nuggets and Houston Rockets.
The game between the two teams is not as suspense as outsiders think.
The first battle between the two sides was easily won by the Rockets.
James Harden played extremely well in this game. He scored an astonishing 41 points. In addition to him, Eric Gordon also performed very well and scored 30 points.
As another core member of the team, Chris Paul scored 14 points and 7 assists in this game. His performance was not outstanding. However, the team was able to perform at its best because of his connection, so his contribution is unparalleled. and.
On the other hand, for the Nuggets, Nikola Jokic scored 26 points and 14 rebounds. The data is not bad, but the others are obviously much worse.
Jamal Murray scored 15 points and 7 rebounds, and Paul Millsap had 14 points and 11 rebounds.
Here are the Nuggets’ three highest-scoring players.
Others' scoring performance was average, and more importantly, they were unable to play a greater role in the team's final moments, so the Nuggets could only watch as they were killed by the Rockets.
After the first game in the East and West, several teams quickly ushered in the second game.
Taking advantage of their home court advantage, the Knicks once again defeated the Raptors. This time the two sides scored 129 to 121, and the Knicks won by 8 points.
Leonard scored the highest score for the Raptors. He handed over 36 points, 6 assists and 6 rebounds.
Lowry performed poorly. He was stared at by Zhao Feiyang throughout the game, and in the end he only scored 11 points and 7 assists.
Looking back at the Knicks, Zhao Feiyang scored 30 points and provided 11 assists.
LaVine scored 19 points and Adrian scored 17 points while grabbing 9 rebounds.
Inside, Porzingis also scored 18 points and 16 rebounds, and Dwight Howard and DeAndre Jordan combined to score 26 points and 19 rebounds.
The Knicks' superior strength once again surprised the Raptors.
Among other teams, the Bucks were pulled back by the 76ers, with the score tied at 1-1. The Warriors continued to defeat the Trail Blazers, scoring 2-0.
The Nuggets were once again defeated by the Rockets, and the score between the two sides also became 0-2.
At this time, the outside world also began to speculate on the final pattern of the Eastern and Western Conference finals.
Someone initiated a vote on the Internet. On the Eastern side, fans who ultimately supported the Bucks and Knicks in entering the Eastern Conference finals did more.
In the Western Conference, the most fans support the Warriors and Rockets in entering the Western Conference Finals.
Time flies.
In the blink of an eye, the East-West series reached Game 5.
Before Game 4, the Warriors had swept the Trail Blazers 0-25. Although Lillard averaged + points per game in the series, he ultimately failed to save the team from defeat.
The Rockets and Nuggets tied the score 3-1. After many seasons of hard work, Harden finally showed his "king spirit" this time. In the eyes of many outside fans, he won this season. His performance was his best in recent years.
Regardless of statistics or actual performance, he is worthy of being the star of the Rockets and his status as a top star.
In the East, the Bucks and the 76ers also played 3-1. Under the crazy output of Antetokounmpo Giannis, the 76ers were simply defeated. Even if they had hope of regaining the situation, they were ruined by Antetokounmpo's 29 points in the fourth game.
The Knicks and Raptors tied 3-1.
The Raptors' performance really exceeded many people's expectations. In the fourth game, they almost pulled back two games in a row.
Fortunately, at the critical moment, Howard seized the opportunity to grab a key rebound and also sent an assist to Zhao Feiyang, allowing him to score a difficult pull-up layup. This cut off the Raptors' hope. Otherwise, Leonard's performance would have been so fierce. It's entirely possible that the Dragons can take down the Knicks and take the win.
All six teams have come to a fork in the season. The winning team can advance to the finals, while the losing team will end the season and enter the offseason. All previous efforts will disappear with the end of the season.