Healing Basketball

  Chapter 690 690. Focus Battle

   With 69 wins and 12 losses, the Trail Blazers tied the Bulls and the Lakers for second place in NBA history. At the end of the 2005-2006 regular season, people's attention focused on the Trail Blazers and the Suns.

   The opponent of the Trail Blazers in the last game of the regular season is the Suns!

   Only by beating the Suns can the Trail Blazers win 70 games!

  The importance of this game was raised after the Trail Blazers lost to the Nuggets and defeated the Jazz.

  Originally, people thought that the Trail Blazers would definitely win both games, and winning or losing the last game was not that important. The suspense of 70 wins came to the last game, which was indeed beyond most people's expectations.

At this time, Liu Xiu’s 40+ triple-double against the Jazz a few days ago became a hot topic again—if the Trail Blazers hadn’t been able to reverse the Jazz and win the victory that day, they might have bid farewell to the hope of 70 wins against the Nuggets. .

The day after the Trail Blazers won 69 wins, at 9:58 p.m. on April 17th, after 2 hours and 28 minutes of play, the Suns beat the Hornets 115-78 at home, ending their season finale. A home game improved the record to 54 wins and 27 losses.

  After this game, there is another topic in the regular season finale between the Suns and the Trail Blazers-will the Suns win 55 or the Trail Blazers win 70?

  The two records seem to be very different, but this topic is very hot!

  Sports Illustrated reporter said in the game preview that his MVP vote will go to the winner of this game.

The reason convinced many people-the Suns won 50 wins without Stoudemire, an insider who can average 25+ points per game, which is already incredible. It can be used to win 54 To describe it as the God of point guards, if you can get 55 wins, not to mention the consecutive MVPs, the three consecutive MVPs are worth voting for.

   At this time Kobe was pulled out and hanged-he didn't make the playoffs in the first year without O'Neal.

  Even if they make it to the playoffs this year, they don't even have 50 wins.

  In addition to this, after the game between the Suns and the Hornets, a new topic emerged-the battle for the assist king!

   Originally, Nash had always been in the lead. Although the advantage was slowly eroded by Liu Xiu, the advantage has always been there.

  If the two play normally, by the end of the season, Liu Xiu will still fall behind Nash.

  But the last match between the two of them was not normal.

The two have slammed their opponents crazily in the last game. However, when Liu Xiu led the team to slam the Jazz with 40 points, he got 18 assists; when Nash led the team to slam the Hornets, Nash only played 21 minutes. , scored 12 points, 1 rebound and 6 assists, and did not play in the second half.

  After Liu Xiu got 18 assists, the total number of assists in the season increased to 910. After playing 81 games, his average assists per game increased from 11.15 to 11.234.

   After Nash got 6 assists, the total number of assists in the season increased to 874. After playing 78 games, his average assists per game dropped from 11.27 to 11.205.

  Sports Illustrated called Nash the "God of Point Guards", and ESPN felt that if Liu Xiu finally won the assists title, no matter whether he won 69 wins or not, he would perform better than Nash.

  This statement has also been supported by many people.

  …

  The time came to April 18th, and the number of games today was obviously more than usual, because today is the beginning of the curtain call of the regular season. There are a total of 9 games, plus tomorrow's 6 games, the regular season of this season will come to an end.

  At 11:26 p.m., the Spurs defeated the Rockets at home, raising their record to 63 wins and 19 losses. Today's game is all over.

  Although there are still 6 games to be played tomorrow, the list and ranking of the playoffs have all been determined.

East: Pistons first, Heat second, Nets third, Pacers fourth, Cavaliers fifth, Raptors sixth, Bulls seventh, Wizards eighth; West: Trail Blazers First, the Spurs second, the Suns third, the Mavericks fourth, the Clippers fifth, the Grizzlies sixth, the Nuggets seventh, and the Lakers eighth.

  Because the Nuggets defeated the Sonics at home today and ended the regular season with 49 wins and 33 losses, even if the Lakers defeated the Mavericks at home tomorrow, they would only win 48. The Nuggets advanced to the playoffs in seventh place in the West.

   Arrived on April 19, the last game day of the 2005-2006 season regular season arrived.

The eyes of basketball fans are focused on Portland. No one cares about the other 5 games. The ranking has been determined. There are two suspenses: 70 wins or 55 wins for the Suns, and Liu Xiu and Nash who can win the assists king.

   At 4:00 p.m., the unnoticed game between the Eastern Celtics and the Knicks started, sounding the horn of the regular season.

  At 7:40 p.m., the two warm-up teams began to enter the Rose Garden Arena.

The first entry was the visiting Suns. They enjoyed the most enthusiastic boos of the Trail Blazers this season. In the eyes of the Trail Blazers fans, there is no regular season game in their entire team history that is more important than tonight. .

  After Nash was the last one to run out of the visiting team's tunnel, it was the home team's turn. Liu Xiu led his teammates to run out of the tunnel.

  The Trail Blazers fans who came to the scene wanted to witness history and see the second 70-win team in NBA history.

  Even if they are 'just' competing for second place, they want to be uniquely second, not tied with the other two teams!

  After the players of the two teams played, the data of Liu Xiu and Nash were posted on the big screen.

   Neither Liu Xiu nor Nash was in a hurry to talk to each other. Hearing the exclamation of the fans, they looked at the big screen in unison.

  Liu Xiu has a player detection report, but he still looks up at the big screen. There must be a sense of ritual when playing.

  Nash has played 78 games so far this season, averaging 19 points, 4.2 rebounds, 11.2 assists, 0.8 steals, and 0.2 blocks per game, shooting 51.2% from the field, 43.6% from three-pointers, and 92% from free throws.

   Averaged career highs in points and rebounds per game.

  The hit rate is the most exaggerated, 51+43+92 hit rate, super rich 180 club performance!

Nash's shooting percentage and free throw percentage are career highs, but three-pointers are not. In the era when perimeter defense can be used, in the 01-02 season, Nash had a 45.5% three-point shooting percentage, averaging 1.9 three-pointers per game. point.

  Liu Xiu looked at Nash's performance and understood why Lionel always expressed his dissatisfaction with the 2004-05 season MVP being snatched away by Nash, but he didn't complain that Nash had only 54 wins in the 05-06 season but won the MVP consecutively.

   Nash's performance is terrible!

   On the other side, watching Liu Xiu played 81 games, averaging 25.2 points, 7 rebounds, 11.2 assists, 3.1 steals and 0.8 blocks per game, shooting 51% from the field, 34.9% from the three-point range, and 90.4% from the free throw line...

  Think about that 38-point-per-game guy in Los Angeles...

  Nash: Fortunately, I have already won the MVP once, otherwise this year's MVP competition will not cause a heart attack?

  (end of this chapter)