Chapter 1341 - 21: You Are Already a Dead Man_2

Moreover, just follow the map to trace it, it basically follows the transmission route: America-Japan-Hong Kong and Taiwan-mainland, Americans can be considered the founding fathers.

Even though the news content is quite absurd, the relationship between Clinton and Gan Guoyang is indeed pretty good; they really have known each other for a long time.

During elections, when facing minority groups, Clinton indeed would play the Gan Guoyang card.

In the West Coast Region, Gan Guoyang’s influence is still significant, with blue completely covering this area.

Gan Guoyang didn’t expect that these things would bring him considerable trouble in the future.

In the next two days, the Trail Blazers had consecutive away games against the New Jersey Nets and the New York Knicks.

They defeated the Nets, avoiding consecutive losses, but then lost to the New York Knicks at Madison.

The Knicks have quite a formidable lineup, with Kemp, Mourning, Glen Rice, and Alan Houston forming the basic framework of the team.

The Knicks’ head coach is a scrawny guy with a bald head and dark circles, who’s never played professional basketball—Jeff Van Gundy.

Van Gundy served as assistant coach for the New York Knicks starting in 1990, and became the head coach by the 1994-1995 season.

He is a thoroughly defensive coach who hasn’t played professional basketball but is a very experienced basketball strategy research expert.

Since 1990, he has been immersed in researching how to build more solid and tougher defense, but the Knicks’ style has always kept him from being truly utilized.

Until 1994 when Ewing left, the Knicks started rebuilding, and Van Gundy became the helm of the Knicks, beginning to reshape the team’s style.

After getting Alonzo Mourning, snatching Alan Houston from the Pistons, alongside Rice and Kemp, the Knicks already have quite a strong lineup foundation.

Van Gundy is very adept at creating defensive traps, believing that the defense used to be reactive, just waiting for the offense to attack, often resulting in passive situations.

To have stronger defense, one should be proactive, not just adapt passively, but actively dig a pit to lure opponents into making mistakes.

In Van Gundy’s defensive system, pressure on the ball handler is highly emphasized, similar to the Supersonics’ SOS defensive system, often constantly targeting the opponent’s Point Guard.

The difference with SOS lies in Van Gundy’s system that places a strong emphasis on protecting the basket, not easily sacrificing the inside for pressure.

The Knicks big men are all required to come out to delay smaller players.

Almost every round, Mourning and Kemp would finally come out to delay the ball handler, then immediately retract to protect the Three Second Zone.

Based on this basic rule, Van Gundy wove many defensive traps, leading ball handlers into "dead ends."

For instance, driving them to the baseline, trapping them in a three-man encirclement without any passing route, or forcing them to pass to a player without autonomous offensive ability, forcing inefficient solo plays.

Every pass and choice by the ball handler seems completed autonomously but is actually guided consciously by Knicks players, inducing dead ends based on players’ characteristics and offensive habits.

For instance, if a player is proficient with the right hand and generally weak in left-hand breakthrough, the defense would block the right hand, leaving the left open, with big men waiting inside.

Or if an external player has deficient offensive ability, he would be left open to receive the ball and go one-on-one, but actually, his efficiency is low, unable to produce results.

The Trail Blazers, whose offensive system was not yet formed, naturally struggled against the disciplined, complete system of the New York Knicks.

Rick Carlisle’s so-called "Fluid Offense" was still under theoretical construction, even he was confused, let alone making the players understand.

During the game, the Trail Blazers repeatedly made mistakes and eventually had to give the ball to Gan Guoyang for him to hold the ball.

In this match, at Madison Square Garden Arena, Gan Guoyang scored 41 points, which wasn’t considered a very high score in Gan Guoyang’s career.

However, in a regular match, the Trail Blazers only scored 75 points, with Gan Guoyang scoring more than half the team’s total.

There was no choice; against the Knicks’ minefield-like defense, the Trail Blazers struggled and ultimately had to rely on the leader.

Ultimately, the Trail Blazers lost 75:80, a 5-point deficit against the Knicks, ending this Eastern tour with a 2-2 record.

This match made Gan Guoyang quite frustrated; the Trail Blazers trailed significantly in the first half, at one point trailing the Knicks by 15 points.

Trail Blazers players were unaccustomed to the Knicks’ defense, completely subdued.

This defensive-minded Knicks team, once the gap reached 15 points, was essentially sealing the fate of the game.

Gan Guoyang initially thought it wasn’t a big deal to lose this match early in the season, treating it as practice, a lesson for the players.

Unexpectedly, during the official time-out in the middle of the second quarter, Jeff Van Gundy abruptly shouted at Gan Guoyang, "This isn’t your Time! You shouldn’t be back!"

At that time, Gan Guoyang was fiercely contesting with Mourning and Kemp under the basket, and a foul call on Mourning led to Van Gundy’s dissatisfaction, thus provoking.

Afterward, Van Gundy explained, saying he did this to encourage the players to confront Ah Gan and not be afraid.

But in reality, when Van Gundy said that, the Knicks players were scared stiff.