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Chapter 369 - 171. The Wild Mid-Season_2

Chapter 369: 171. The Wild Mid-Season_2

On the 22nd, playing at home against the Trail Blazers, Randolph wanted to go on a rampage again, but he was besieged by the returning Gerald Wallace, an angry Okafor, the tough Millsap, and Muhammad, managing only 6 out of 18 shots and scoring just 15 points, while Zhang Yang shot 11 out of 25 to score 29 points, leading the Bobcats to a 94-81 victory...

After defeating the Trail Blazers, Zhang Yang, while icing after his physiotherapy and massage, felt an unprecedented sense of relaxation.

The hellish schedule from December 26th to January 22nd had finally ended, with 17 games in 28 days, including five back-to-backs, and even a stretch of four games in five days!

In these 17 games, the Bobcats achieved a record of 10 wins and 7 losses, a winning percentage of 59%, which is considerably lower than the 67% winning percentage (18 wins and 9 losses) from the early season, but he had shot his best.

During this period, not only did he have to deal with his teammates’ fatigue and poor shooting touch, but he also faced the absence of key teammates due to injuries, his own periods of poor form, and opponents’ surges... But they had finally persevered!

After completing his physiotherapy, Zhang Yang returned home and checked the standings online: the Pistons at the top with 29 wins and 13 losses, the Bobcats second with 28 wins and 16 losses, Chicago Bulls third with 23 wins and 19 losses, Miami Heat fourth owing to the Southeast Division’s top spot with 22 wins and 22 losses, and the Cavaliers with 23 wins and 19 losses, down to fifth place after losing 1-2 in direct confrontations with the Bulls...

Mid-season in the Eastern Conference, other strong teams also struggled, as the league scheduled many blockbuster matchups this month, including star-studded showdowns, like the Bobcats facing the 76ers twice in a short period, which were pitched as 3vs3 battles, except Iverson had been traded away, and the 76ers got thrashed both times without much of a splash.

Entering mid-season, the Pistons had a record of 10 wins and 5 losses in their last 15 games, just slightly better than the Bobcats’ record of 10 wins and 7 losses.

The Cavaliers had lost more games by now, having been overtaken by the Chicago Bulls and slipping to fifth in the East.

While Zhang Yang felt okay about his own team’s Eastern Conference standings, the Western Conference’s records were a different story... The Suns at the top with 34 wins and 8 losses, the Mavericks close behind with 34 wins and 9 losses, the Spurs at third with 31 wins and 11 losses, the Jazz at fourth in the West and fifth in the league with 28 wins and 14 losses, and the Rockets in fifth in the West with 28 wins and 16 losses, dropping to seventh in the league because they lost direct confrontations with the Bobcats...

He had just one question—how are the Eastern Conference teams going to face the Western Conference teams in the Finals?

To put it another way, which team could avoid being swept when faced with the Suns, Mavericks, or Spurs?

Before mid-season, although the gap in records between the East and the West was apparent, it was still somewhat tolerable.

After entering mid-season, that gap in records widened to an unbearable extent!

The Suns hadn’t lost a game since the 26th, streaking 15 wins in a row, with their last loss occurring before Christmas on the 23rd.

The Mavericks had an outrageous run as well, winning 14 out of their last 15 games, stringing together multiple winning streaks.

The Spurs also boasted a record of 13 wins and 2 losses.

Looking back at the East, the Pistons and Bulls with a record of 10 wins and 5 losses were already the best-performing teams... He closed the official website, no longer wanting to look at the standings, envious of the Western Conference’s top three.

Since his computer was already on, he decided to browse some news.

It wasn’t just him who thought his team had finally gotten through the most difficult part of the mid-season; after their game against the Trail Blazers, many media outlets were discussing the Bobcats’ performance over the past four weeks and 17 games.

When the league released the new season’s schedule in September, the media noticed the particularly challenging mid-season schedules for the Rockets and Bobcats.

At that time, attention was focused on the Rockets, featuring Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady, with no one anticipating the Bobcats’ strong start to the season, not even Charlotte’s own coaching staff and players.

Therefore, after Christmas, the Bobcats also came under intense media scrutiny.

Although Zhang Yang hadn’t been following the news much during that time, Felton occasionally filled him in with some media comments, such as criticisms about him shooting too much.

Now, he saw a summary of his shooting stats over that period... indeed, he had shot quite a bit...

Especially in the last 9 games where he shot at least 25 times in 8 of them, with the only exception being against the Knicks, where he was double-teamed and "only" shot 22 times. He took a total of 239 shots in those 9 games, averaging 26.5 shots per game.

Some media compiled a set of data for comparison, indicating that among active players, only one had a comparable number of shot attempts during a contract period with a rookie—Allen Iverson!

Iverson averaged 26 shots per game in the last 10 games of his rookie season, which included the run of five consecutive 40+ point games towards the end of his rookie year; and in February of his sophomore season, he averaged 25 shots in nine games.

But even Iverson, during his explosive shooting phases in his first and second years, never shot as much as Zhang Yang.

In 9 games, Zhang Yang averaged 26.5 shots per game, scored 30.8 points, paired with a record of just 5 wins and 4 losses in those games, which attracted quite a lot of media criticism—but there were also those who spoke up in his defense.

The Los Angeles media analyzed the Bobcats’ performance from various aspects, such as individual player performances and injury situations.

Okafor played in 15 of the 17 games since mid-season began, averaging 28 minutes and 14.2 points with 8.8 rebounds, providing more playing time for Perkins and Millsap.

The pure defensive Center Perkins could only do so much; Millsap was more versatile and capable of doing more, but he too hit the rookie wall mid-season, as opponents understood him better. He had never played such a dense schedule before, with almost as many games in the first two months of the season as he played in an entire college season. His performance could only be said to be not too poor for a rookie big man, without as drastic a downturn as Morrison, who slipped from an average of 19 points to just 9.