Basketball Legend: When Pride Still Matters-Chapter 591 425: It’s Always_4
Yu Fei aggressively barged into Barnes twice, nearly sending his body tumbling down.
In just a moment, Yu Fei spun towards the basket with agile movement, arriving beneath it as Garnett and PJ Brown both took to the air. Yet, Yu Fei was crossing the ball between his hands back and forth, eventually scooping it up with his left hand under PJ Brown's armpit onto the backboard.
An impossible angle, an impossible way of shooting.
"Swish!!!!!"
Simmons held his head with both hands, "NOOOOOOOO~~~!!!!!"
It was a shot that could drive one to despair.
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Yu Fei spun around, disregarding the astonished Garnett, simply giving PJ Brown a significant look.
Words that Yu Fei had once said echoed in PJ Brown's heart.
88 to 81
"Frye has scored 15 of the Supersonics' last 17 points, now his personal tally has reached 40 points," Mike Breen said, "Who can stop him now?"
The obsession to defeat Yu Fei maddened Red.
At this moment, when every shot was critical to the outcome, Red proved with his actions why he was no Ray Allen.
In terms of shooting technique, it's hard to definitively say who was better. Judging by their age, Red in that year was in better physical and competitive shape than Ray Allen. But compared to the latter, he lacked something crucial.
Respect for discipline, understanding of the game, and the value of the team—these three things together represent personal belief. His philosophy of the game was completely different from Ray Allen's. The latter could totally assimilate as one of the "Big Three," whereas Red, who entered the League as a second-round pick, had never possessed such awareness or belief. Everything he achieved came from struggling. When Frye's presence negated him, he wanted to change outsiders' perceptions of him through his own strength.
That's why people could see, when tactics failed, he still demanded that Rondo pass him the ball and then, the moment he received it, without any care, he would just pull up and shoot a three-pointer.
"Bang!!!"
The three-pointer clanked off the rim, and Red watched that infuriating No. 44 from the Supersonics grab the rebound, ready to launch a counterattack on the spot.
"I won't let you succeed!!!"
Red roared as he chased after him.
His entire body was pressed against Yu Fei, drawing boos from the crowd; it was definitely a foul.
But the boos only lasted a few seconds because just outside the frontcourt three-point line, Yu Fei suddenly came to a halt at full speed. Red, trying to find his footing, was overwhelmed by Yu Fei's body pressure, uncontrollably falling backward.
At that moment, Red's heart broke.
He watched as Yu Fei, with almost perfect form, leaped and shot a three. That detestable face was full of confidence, as if he was the most valuable human being on the planet. Why was it so loathsome? Why did it have to be this man?
In the blink of an eye, judgment time arrived.
Yu Fei's chase-down three swished through the net, sending Key Arena into complete turmoil, the noise from all directions was so loud that Red couldn't hear the scorer's table, and Rivers desperately called for a timeout in despair.
Less than 100 seconds remained in the game, 91 to 81.
This shot was as good as a death sentence for the Celtics.
Between the hero and the sinner, Red chose the latter. His desperate three-pointer turned into adventurism; his efforts to integrate himself into the team and improve his personal image with a stable performance throughout the season suddenly lost their meaning.
Whether or not he changed himself, whether he sacrificed for the team, what his presence meant for the Celtics, it no longer mattered. The basketball world would remember this round and use it to erase all his past contributions. His sacrifice was meaningless. His transformation was fake. His past glories were only because he had been teammates with Yu Fei. He was a loser, always had been.
"Michael, I wasn't wrong at all," Yu Fei said with a smile, as if sharing a great joy with an old friend. "The key to my six championships in five years was indeed with you!"
In that instant, something inside Michael Redd died.
They vanished silently, never to return.
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The person who stole his glory left those words that made Red's spirit crumble and turned to leave the court.
The Celtics ultimately lost the game without waiting for Paul Pierce to return.
There is no truth here.
In the last 90 seconds, Pierce came back.
But the outcome had already been decided.
The final surge of resistance seemed to lack any strength.
At the end, 93 to 83, the Supersonics defeated The Celtics at home, leading the series 3-2, and made their opponents the first team in history to lose every away game in the finals.
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"I am proud of my players, each one of them became the best version of themselves tonight. The finals are not over, let's wait and see," Doug Rivers said to reporters.
"If you hear someone say, 'It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game,' that person probably lost. I am very willing to talk about the game, but I think you are not interested in finding out, you just want to know what happened in the fourth quarter. Let's put it this way, our fourth quarter strategy was to tell everyone else to get lost and let Frye handle all the problems!" George Karl added, "You have to admit that it worked like a charm."
"How do you know I scored 22 points with Frye in the fourth quarter?" Brandon Roy said proudly regarding his fourth-quarter performance.
"I didn't get any screens, I didn't get enough support, I don't regret my choices then, and if given another chance, I would do it the same way," Michael Redd responded to the controversial shots in the fourth quarter.
"Don't ask what your teammates can do for you, ask what you can do for your teammates," Shawn Marion added, "I am proud of Frye, and I think he would be proud of me too."
"To succeed...you need to find something that supports you, something that motivates you, something that inspires you," Kevin Durant said as he spent 20 minutes discussing how his performance of making only 2 out of 11 shots helped the team win, arranged by Nike.
In the entire game, Yu Fei racked up 45 points, 14 rebounds, 14 assists, 5 blocks, and 5 steals, becoming the only player in finals history to have a 45+10+10+5+5 stat line in a single game.
When he arrived at the media room, nearly a hundred media outlets from around the world were gathered there.
"You previously predicted that The Celtics would lose every away game, how does it feel to make it happen?"
"It's not a prediction, they haven't won in the Eastern Conference, so naturally, they wouldn't win in the finals. So, I just stated something that was bound to happen," he said.
"How did you manage to score 20 out of the team's 22 points in the fourth quarter?"
"Go ask Brandon about that, we together scored 22 points, I just made a small contribution," he said.
"Paul Pierce soiled himself during the game, do you think it has anything to do with you?"
"If you insist on thinking that way, I can only tell you that I'll be more cautious with his ass next time," he said.
"Bill Simmons claims that the Supersonics achieved a three-game winning streak by virtue of home-court advantage, what do you think?"
"All I can say is, basketball is like baseball, the more people involved in it, the less they understand it," he said.
The last question came from Jack McCallum, a "Sports Illustrated" writer who had been following the Supersonics for a season: "How confident are you about clinching the championship in Boston?"
"100%," he said.
"Why?"
"Because no one can beat me four times in a row," he said.
McCallum got the satisfying answer he was looking for but couldn't help reminding this seemingly arrogant superstar: "Do you remember 2005?"
"You know, Jack," Yu Fei stood up, ready to leave, his face wearing a sincerely warm smile, "I didn't lose, the game just ended."
PS: You know, there's definitely only one chapter today.
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