The Golden Age of Basketball-Chapter 564 - 64 Uninvited Guest

Every time there was a major game, Gan Guoyang would become very focused.

Whenever he was focused, it was as if he had come to a pure white plateau.

In fact, Gan Guoyang had never been to a real plateau, the snowy regions above 5,000 meters in altitude.

In comparison, the plateaus of Colorado and Utah in America were nothing but slightly higher rocky slopes.

As a child, Guoyang had a wish to visit the plateau and see the sky there, which he heard was especially blue and vast.

The plateau was open and quiet, the whole world seemed to become peaceful, and people would calm down as well.

He also heard that one’s spirit could be purified and washed by the plateau.

Of course, the reality might not be so, as Gan later heard that the plateau was smelly, littered with feces everywhere.

Which was true and which was false, Guoyang didn’t know since he had never been to a real plateau.

Luckily, he had never been, so when he was focused, he came to an imagined plateau, where everything seemed even more perfect.

Everything around him was quiet, the air was bright, and time seemed to slow down.

Everything became more precise, his breathing, his movements, the sensation of the ball in his hands.

He could even see clearly Drexler’s goatee, the sweat on Moses Malone’s head, Charles Barkley’s mouthguard, Bernard King’s knee pads, Wes Unseld’s glasses, Jack Ramsay’s floral shirt, Terry Porter’s elbow pads... everything was under his control.

As for the shouts of the fans on the sidelines, the trash talk, the loud mockery, all those messy banners, they were completely outside his range of attention.

His brain was so concentrated, rallying all his senses and energy, focused only on matters related to the game, blocking out all the rest.

After scoring six points in a row, he noticed the Bullets players’ expressions hinting at slight anxiety, with Charles Barkley signaling towards Kolter.

Gan Guoyang and Thompson exchanged a signal, indicating that he would help defend shortly.

The Bullets’ offense was rather monotonous, centered mostly on one-on-one plays, and they had many players who specialized in that.

Barkley received the ball at the 45-degree mark and drove in with it, while Guoyang left Malone to come over for the double team.

Barkley attempted to pass the ball, but under sudden heavy pressure, his pass hit Gan Guoyang’s hand.

The ball flew into the air, and Gan leaped up to grab it before throwing a long pass downcourt where Jerome Kossie caught the ball and dunked it in a fast break.

The Trail Blazers, once trailing 0 to 6, successfully played an 8-0 run, taking the lead in the score.

Seeing this, Unseld immediately called a timeout to make adjustments.

After the timeout, the Bullets slowed down and continued to look for Barkley on the offense.

The Bullets’ duo of low-post players backed up by offensive rebounds was the foundational stone of their offense.

Barkley made a beautiful pivot to get past Thompson.

But Thompson blocked Barkley’s layup from behind!

The scramble under the basket was chaotic, but Gan Guoyang firmly controlled the ball.

The Trail Blazers’ following offense did not score either.

Gan Guoyang, double-teamed in the low post, passed the ball out to the perimeter.

Porter, with a wide-open chance beyond the three-point line, took the shot but did not hit it.

The Trail Blazers seemed to continue the shooting touch of the previous game, still struggling with their outside shooting.

Soon after, Barkley’s mid-range shot also didn’t go in, and Kossie grabbed the defensive rebound.

Kossie and Porter executed a counterattack, with Kossie receiving the ball on the wing, faked a move to get past Bernard King, and his off-the-backboard shot at the basket scored.

The Trail Blazers led 10 to 6, up by four points, and the situation was gradually tilting in favor of the Trail Blazers.

The basic reason was that the Bullets’ relied-upon low post offense and offensive rebounds didn’t seem quite enough when faced with Gan Guoyang.

In the Eastern Conference, even against Boston’s frontcourt trident, against the Pistons’ brutish squad, the Bullets had displayed very good efficiency.

But faced with Ah Gan, and now Thompson who had gained a son, the Bullets, except for the third game, had a mess of an inside line in the first two games.

Therefore, the Bullets’ offense shifted their focus to the perimeter, with Bernard King receiving the ball on the baseline, turning to single out Kossie, drawing a foul on him.

King stood at the free throw line, the bandage on his right knee especially conspicuous, a mark of the pain he had endured.

King made both free throws, and the Bullets caught up by two points.

However, Gan Guoyang immediately received the ball in the low post in the same position and before the double team arrived, he spun around swiftly escaping Malone, then easily laid it in for a score.

This spinning speed, this way of turning, was identical to the peak of Bernard King.

Seeing Gan’s move, Bernard King couldn’t help but admire it, a center being able to execute such a quick spin move for an attack.

Gan Guoyang’s nerve-gathering ability must be many times stronger than that of an ordinary player.

On the other hand, Bernard King also thought, why did he teach him everything in the first place?

Now it’s done; he has become an insurmountable peak on his own path to the championship.

King was well aware that, for most teams and players, the chance to win a championship is often fleeting.

They are not the Celtics or the Lakers, nor the Trail Blazers, with a roster overflowing with talent that can make consecutive Finals to chase the championship.

The only truly young and promising person on the Bullets is Charles Barkley.

Moses Malone and Moncrief are both declining year after year, already in the late stages of their careers.

Bernard King himself also knew he couldn’t return to his peak, and what his state would be next season was uncertain.

This year they defeated the Detroit Pistons, but can they do it again next year? And there are the Chicago Bulls.

The future of the Bullets is not bright; this year might be their only opportunity.

With this in mind, Bernard King exerted all his effort on offense, dribbling and charging to the basket.

But Jerome Kossie covered King, and his close-range shot did not hit the mark.

Guoyang grabbed the defensive rebound inside, withstanding the assault of Barkley and Moses Malone.

Guoyang passed the ball to Jerome Kossie, and the Trail Blazers launched a counterattack.

Moncrief chose to foul early, not letting Kossie get started.

Tonight, aside from Guoyang, Kossie’s performance was the most outstanding.

On defense, he could keep up with Guoyang’s pace, and on offense, he coordinated well with Guoyang.

On the other hand, Drexler, Moncrief’s close-up defense on him was effective.

The logic of defending Drexler was simple: let him shoot and then stop his fast break.

The Trail Blazers didn’t have many fast breaks, Moncrief was shorter and quicker on his feet, just sticking to Drexler, shooting as you please.

Drexler completely lost his scoring touch, averaging only 16 points in the first three games, not at all like a second option.

The Finals’ intensity once again proved that Drexler currently does not qualify as the second core of the Trail Blazers’ dual-core setup.

He could only be the regular season’s second core; in the playoffs, especially in the high-intensity defense of the Finals, the Trail Blazers had to rely on a single core approach.

Back in the half court offense, Guoyang received Kossie’s pass on the flank, and facing the defense of Moses Malone, he pulled up for a mid-range jumper, another hit!

This season, Guoyang had indeed reached the level of ’a masterful sword without edge, effortlessly skillful,’ with his mid-range technique on an extremely high level.

On the Trail Blazers’ bench, Bobby Berman said with some pride in his voice, "Sonny’s mid-range, even Bird at the same age couldn’t compare."

Ramsay said, "What, you taught him that?"

Berman replied, "The first training camp Sonny attended, I was the one who coached his shooting!"

Berman still remembered those days at the basketball camp in San Francisco, when Guoyang first trained in shooting, only two of his shots touched the rim, and the rest were all net, barely grazing the net without touching the rim. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Since then, Berman had known this kid was exceptionally talented.

But he never expected him to fully tap into that talent.

Look at his now strong physique, his outstanding upper body strength.

It not only didn’t affect his shooting percentage but made his shots even more stable.

This effortless mid-range jumper was backed by countless hours of sweat and innumerable repetitions in training.

Ramsay, watching Guoyang’s shooting, said, "If he keeps playing like this, maybe he can really play until he’s 50."

With Guoyang’s strong performance on both offense and defense, the Trail Blazers led the Bullets by 7 points at 24:17 in the first quarter.

In the second quarter, Guoyang rested for three minutes and then re-entered the game, his ruthless mid-range shots piercing through what the Bullets thought was an impregnable defense like a sword.

The Bullets’ tight defense was extremely effective against post plays and penetrations, but faced with Guoyang’s catapult-like mid and long-range shooting, they were stressed to the max.

In the second quarter, Guoyang’s shooting got smoother and smoother, and after a while, Moses Malone couldn’t bear it any longer, rushing up to hard slap Guoyang’s hand, a clear shooting foul!

Malone would rather send Guoyang to the free-throw line than watch him keep shooting like that, it was too damaging to his pride.

In a slow-paced game with strong defense, Guoyang’s precise mid-range was deadly.

In the second quarter, he shot 7 out of 8, took 4 free throws and made them all, scoring 18 points for the quarter, and helped the Trail Blazers lead the Bullets by 12 points at 55:43 by halftime.

If they let Guoyang continue to play like this in the third quarter, or if the Bullets couldn’t respond offensively, the Washingtonians were going to be in trouble tonight.

The halftime break gave the Bullets a chance to catch their breath, hoping Guoyang’s hot hand would cool off.

However, what the Trail Blazers players didn’t expect was the sudden appearance of an unwelcome visitor in the locker room, disturbing the team’s morale.