Champion Creed
Chapter 121 - 121 072 Easily Dominated Defending Champion Requesting Monthly Votes!_3

121: 072: Easily Dominated Defending Champion (Requesting Monthly Votes!)_3 121: 072: Easily Dominated Defending Champion (Requesting Monthly Votes!)_3 Then O’Neal found that Olajuwon had run to guard Grant, and the Rockets actually used Thorpe to guard himself.

He immediately raised his hand for the ball, and Thorpe directly moved in front to guard, sitting right on O’Neal’s legs.

Roger noticed something, and he quickly called Grant to come up and perform a pick and roll with him.

After getting around the screen, indeed, that familiar oppressive feeling returned.

Hakeem Olajuwon was like a huge net in front of Roger, and Roger was like a little fish, hardly able to escape.

Not, like last season when it was hard to escape.

Now, Roger had ways to tear this net apart.

Facing the defense of Olajuwon, Roger immediately passed the ball to Grant, who popped out after the screen.

Roger knew the opportunity was under the basket, but under Olajuwon’s complete cover, his passing ability wasn’t enough to directly assist Shaq.

Thus, he needed to transfer the ball first to Grant.

Although Roger’s assists were low, he wasn’t completely non-passing, he just didn’t directly assist.

Just like last season, Roger hadn’t assisted Pippen even once the entire season, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t pass the ball to Pippen, these are two different concepts.

Passing the ball doesn’t necessarily lead to an assist.

After Roger passed the ball to Grant, Olajuwon quickly lunged over, knowing Grant could make mid-range shots.

But Grant didn’t shoot, he passed the ball to Shaq before the Dream could catch up.

One can’t help but mention another feature of the Magic Team’s lineup — the starting three supporting roles can all pass, and their play is very team-oriented.

Let’s not even mention Harper, who has always been a combo guard.

Derrick McKey and Horace Grant unlike most defensive stalwarts, not only have strong defenses but also possess excellent passing skills and a delicate ability to read the game.

Last season McKey averaged 4.3 assists per game, Grant could act as a pivot in the triangle offense.

For forwards, their passing abilities are undoubtedly superb.

Then Thorpe was under the basket, seeing the giant catch the ball—though the young Shaq wasn’t as frightening in size as the Laker Shaq, he was still a genuine giant.

At that moment, Thorpe was caught in a dilemma.

If he doesn’t defend, he’d let down his teammates.

If he defends, he’d let down his parents!

Eventually, Thorpe mustered his courage, raised his arms high, and stuck to Shaq; meanwhile, Robert Horry immediately rushed under the basket.

The result was, with one push back, Shaq directly pushed Thorpe away, then turned around and faked Horry, finally performing a violent slam dunk over Thorpe right from where he stood.

For him, dunking without a run-up was no trouble at all!

Don’t take a young Shaq for just any shark.

Knocking Thorpe out was still a breeze.

O’Neal happily patted Roger’s head, knowing that if it weren’t for Roger hurting the Rockets, Olajuwon would never have left under the basket.

O’Neal had only played less than ten minutes of an official game with Roger, but he had already hopelessly fallen in love with this man.

He felt that they could be teammates for life.

There would be no accidents.

This score by the Magic Team greatly damaged the Rockets’ morale, as Thorpe and Horry’s defense hadn’t made any mistakes.

Thorpe demonstrated his courage, and Horry had also immediately helped to double-team Shaq.

But they couldn’t stop Shaq from easily scoring 2 points.

Afterwards, on the defensive end Grant continued to double-team the Dream, Olajuwon then steadily passed to the open Horry, but Horry’s long two-pointer didn’t go in.

The Magic got the opportunity to pull ahead in the score, Roger still chose to pick and roll with Grant, which was promptly stopped by Olajuwon’s timely help defense.

This time, Roger found a way to assist Shaq directly.

That was to simply throw the ball up high.

Indeed, Roger didn’t even see where O’Neal was, but after that recent offense, he felt that assisting O’Neal was just a matter of having hands.

The one inside wasn’t the aged Cartwright nor was it Bill Wennington with a 20 cm vertical leap.

He was the best teammate he had encountered so far.

Yes, even better than Andrae.

Shortly after Roger threw the ball, he heard the sound of the hoop being ravaged.

“Shaquille O’Neal with an alley-oop slam!

Someone help poor Otis, help him, if this keeps up he’ll really be torn to pieces by Shaq!” the NBC commentator was already somewhat sympathetic towards Thorpe, this innocent man.

What did he do wrong?

Why must he be tortured in this way?

Roger also discovered for the first time that racking up assists in an official game was such a simple matter.

No wonder people say that you can’t just judge a player’s organizational abilities by their assist numbers, and it’s indeed true.

The Magic regained a 4-point lead, but a sequence later it was stretched to 5 points.

O’Neal continued to cause trouble inside without the Dream, this time Thorpe and Horry both hung directly onto Shaq, finally preventing him from continuing to score.

But they undoubtedly got called for a foul.

Such a familiar scene, last season’s Bulls had to resort to this method to hold back the dominant inside presence.

Now, it’s finally someone else’s turn to experience this pain.

O’Neal made one of two free throws, the Magic extended their lead.

With Shaq contributing from underneath in three consecutive plays, Tomjanovich began to shout at the players on the court, “Hakeem, get back under the basket!”

Tomjanovich wanted to gamble on Roger’s hands, he wanted to constrain Shaq and force Roger to attack.