Carl Malone is ready to give his victory speech. No team in NBA history can complete the reversal with a lag of 0-3: “They have made great progress this season, you don’t want to play another round with them. They never give up and have been trying to make trouble for us. They will definitely be a strong team in the future.”
The final conclusion is that the dust has settled-this is the attitude that Sir Utah treated the series when he led Denver Nuggets 3-0 in the western round in 1994.
It’s over. There’s no suspense. Goodbye.
And the time goes back half a month ago……
On May 8, 1994, dikenbei Mutombo, who was 27 years old and registered, caught his last rebound in the key center and fell to the ground like a child crying bitterly, while his teammates rushed up and overwhelmed him one after another, they jointly constructed one of the classic pictures in NBA history: since the playoff reform in 1984, they became the first team in league history to complete the black eight miracle, moreover, the reversal was completed by pulling the three rounds in the case of losing the two rounds first.
This team is made up of a group of young people. Mutombo, 27, and Reggie Williams, 29, can already be regarded as the veteran of the team, while their other main members laouf, lafanso-Ellis, Parker, stich is no more than 25 years old. The head coach is Dan Issel, the legendary celebrity of nuggets-he was just elected to the Hall of Fame as a player a year ago, but only 45 years old.
Although the first round of the league (63 wins) was hacked, the Nuggets with only 42 wins in the regular season were hardly favored after entering the second round.
Raouf (Curry’s template) is a good shooter and player. It is also the scoring king of the team and a skilled point guard. However, he has won 7 times of support at that time, stockton, who has been selected for All Stars and the best team for six consecutive times, is like playing a broadsword in front of Guan Gong.
Although Mutombo already had the title of defensive gate and became the blocked shots of the season with 4.1 caps, he was only a holding player after all, which was dwarfed by Malone who averaged 25.2 points in the kaleidoscope field.
What’s more, in February of that year, Jue Shi also introduced shooter honasek from 76 people, which further added the depth of the back court.
As a result, as before the start of the first round of the game, no one took the Nuggets into their eyes, and they looked really vulnerable. In the first two games, 91-100 and 94-104 were not hostile. Mutombo’s defense is the most important element for the team to finish the “black eight” in the first round. He sent 12 records cap in the first two games, but this does not have much impact on Malone, the latter completed the China Investment Center within 15-18 feet of RIM by splitting the block with Stockton, scoring 25 points and 32 points respectively-Mutombo could not cover him at all.
“We can’t just do this. We will find the venue, but we will not play well tonight.” Mutombo said after the second game.
He fulfilled his promise. In the third game, he scored 20 points, 13 rebounds and 6 cap of luxury data, and the tough guy forward lafanso Ellis (one of the most terrible contributors in NBA history) scored 25 points, rauf contributed 20 points. With their efforts, the Nuggets reversed the 16-point difference and dragged the game into the plus time. But in overtime, the three points of honasek and the free throw of Stockton killed the game. The two scored 27 and 24 points respectively, and the inner core Malone contributed 26 points and 13 rebounds.
After the game, the whole world was discussing the essence of Stockton and Malone’s removal. They also talked about each other with tacit understanding. You said, “John put in shots”, I said, “thanks to Carl’s attention, I have a chance to score”.
3-0, a desperate number. But only a 2-point difference showed them a glimmer of vitality. Coach Issel said after the game:
“Our players don’t know what giving up is.”
In the fourth game, Nuggets explained what is tenacious at home: they dragged the Jazz down with free throws and slow pace, and at the last moment someone stepped forward to complete the redemption: lafanso and Reggie Williams saved the team, the latter shot in the last 1.9 seconds, and the Nuggets won 83-82.
This is…… Dying?
“He (lafanso) told me that Yogueta didn’t get a shot, it would be passed to me. Therefore, I have been looking for opportunities.” Reggie said that he scored 21 points in the game, “When I shot, I felt that I would enter. They are unprepared for this, and everyone thinks that lafanso will carry out the last attack.”
“We need someone to stand up and finish the final blow, and Reggie is the best candidate, and no one is more suitable than him.” Said lafanso.
“It will be difficult to go to Salt Lake City, but at least we are still alive.” Lord Dan Issel said, “I can’t remember the last time I won there (in fact, it was March 23, 1993, that is to say, the Nuggets have not won at home for more than a year), but at least they dare not underestimate us any more, at least we have not been swept.”
Small-sized explosive hair guards are very popular at present. One of their logo moves is to hit the buckle behind the basket, and Robert Parker of nuggets can represent this kind of defender in 90’s (interested students can search for his dunking collection). In the fifth game in Salt Lake City, this little man with strong athletic ability played the highlight moment of his career: 19 points, 7 assists, 6 steals, he ruled the fourth quarter when the team was once 10 points behind. Finally, the Nuggets reversed 109-101 through two overtime matches, and the total score of the series came to 2-3.
The Nuggets are still behind, but they are still not down.
Another hero was Brian Stedge. He scored 22 points, 8 rebounds and 4 assists in the game. It was his dunk in the second overtime that completely killed the game: “At that time, I know this will be our moment.”
Ralph also scored 22 points and Reggie also contributed 19 points. Mutombo sent out 7 hot pot on the defensive end, and 7 points and 7 boards were recorded. The boss Dan Issel praised every player again: “We stood on the edge of the game five times, but we all won the game in the end, and we will win the next game.”
Interestingly, at half-time, jazz boss Miller also had physical conflicts with Nuggets fans at the scene. After the match, he even made inappropriate remarks to the core Malone of the team in anger, although Miller held a press conference alone and confessed in tears, the league still banned him from watching the rest of the series.
In the sixth game, the Nuggets returned to the home court were full of momentum. Mutombo and Stich won free throws at the last moment respectively, making great contributions to the team’s victory, while Sir hornasek missed the three points at the critical moment, I can only watch the Nuggets win 94-91.
As a jazz master, Malone has no ease of 3-0 hours-at this time, no matter whether he wants this round of series, it will grow twice as fast as he expected, after the game, he obviously became depressed: “We will play hard or go straight home.” Indeed, from 3-0 to 3-3, especially after you pretend to be arrogant, this pressure cannot be carried by ordinary people.
There is no doubt that the Nuggets on the other side are all in a carnival, preparing for the birth of another miracle. They, who have been dogs (Underdog) for so long, are so confident for the first time. Team member Steve’s words are very representative:
“I feel that the series has reached Game 7. Do you think the team that won the first three games will win and win seven? Or will the team that has won three games in a row recently win?”
“I said straight: we have been fearless, just like what we did in Seattle.”
Seattle became a noun on the lips of gold diggers. This city, which was nailed to the column of shame by “black eight miracles”, did not expect it to be only two weeks. The heat just passed and its own was repeatedly mentioned. Yes, Nuggets created miracles on them, so why not create them again in Salt Lake City? Perhaps this is a team destined to create miracles.
“Now it has become a series of winning and losing matches. I think even now, no one is optimistic about us, just like in Seattle at that time. Two weeks ago, we proved that the eighth can beat the 1st, and now we have to prove that the team with a lag of 0-3 can also win the series.” Issel said excitedly after the G6 Game.
“It’s like returning to Seattle. Everything went well. We believe that miracles will happen.” Mutombo expressed the same view, “with the lessons of supersonic speed, all teams are a little afraid of us. If it really happens, I will be too excited to say anything.”
However, miracles also have quotas.
In the last tie break, jazz with obvious strength in the first grade bracing, 91-81 put out everyone’s expectation of miracles and stepped onto the stage of the Western decision with a total score of 4-3. Malone proved his strength with 31 points in a game, and Mutombo on the other side got 12 points and 17 rebounds, unable to return to the sky.
After the game, no one cared about what the Nuggets did. The media were all paying attention to Miller’s boss’s apology to Ma Long and the Jazz team’s opinion on the next discussion against the Rockets.
Maybe the Nuggets should have been eliminated long ago……
But they survived to the last minute of the series.
Yes, “0-3” seems to be a desperate number forever. It is a cutting edge that no team can overcome, but the Nuggets are only 48 minutes short of rewriting it.
There are 7 games in a series, 4 games in one game, 12 minutes in each game, and every 1 minute is the cornerstone to determine decision of a game.
So why not believe that all this is possible?
Maybe all teams that fall behind 0-3 in the series should remember the words of coach Dan Issel, the Nuggets owner:
“We are not dead yet. The future will be very difficult, but at least we are still alive.”
Welcome to our wechat public number “Houchang Village sports team” to see, there are more NBA, CBA related archaeology, comments and character content>>
(Text/South Yangyu)