In the second game of the second phase of the CBA regular season, Shanghai defeated Xinjiang 121-112 to usher in two consecutive wins. This is the ninth time this season that Shanghai has scored at least 110 points in a single game, but while the offensive end is high-speed output, Shanghai's dominance still needs to be strengthened.
This season, under the leadership of head coach Li Chunjiang, Shanghai has become a well-trained team. After a third consecutive offseason of massive reinforcements, the Shanghai team finally began to successfully cash in on paper talents into immediate combat strength. Up to now, Shanghai has averaged 112.3 points per game this season, ranking first in the league, and they and Shanxi have become the only two teams in the league to average 110+ points per game.
Also a luxury lineup configuration, Shanghai has clearly performed better this season than in the past two seasons. Last season, they averaged only 105.1 points per game, the 10th in the league; in the previous season, they averaged only 98.5 points per game, the 15th in the league, which is not difficult to explain the strength of Li Chunjiang's coaching team, after all, the Shanghai team in the past two seasons, whether it is a local player or a foreign aid, the introduction and lineup formation are also very amazing, but the Shanghai team has not been able to show too good performance in the past two seasons.
After scoring 121 points in this match against Xinjiang, Shanghai continued to prove its strong firepower superiority. At the same time, this is also the ninth time this season that they have scored at least 110+ points in a single game, continuing to lead the league. For comparison, Shanxi, which ranks second in the league in terms of average points per game, has scored 110+ points in seven games this season, behind Shanghai. Shenzhen, which is the third team in the league in terms of average points per game, has 110+ in 6 games, Liaoning also has 6 games and 110+, Guangdong and Zhejiang have only 4 games to score 110+, Guangsha has only 3 games, and the remaining other teams have played this performance with the same little or less. After the comparison, it is clear how strong the Shanghai team is on the offensive end.
Under the creation of Li Chunjiang, Shanghai team has truly become a team with considerable depth in the offensive end, and in different games, they can always have players who can stand up on the offensive end to share the pressure, and can also use a lot of scoring means to complete the attack. In this match with Xinjiang, the shanghai team's offensive end is actually not in good shape, and they can't fully open the point difference for a long time. Big foreign player Von Lay scored only 5 points, and the former NBA inside line did not play out his strength at all; Li Tianrong, a young player who averaged double-doubles per game, only scored 2 points and performed poorly. But even so, the Shanghai team still exploded a high score of 121 points. In addition to Wang Zhelin and Franklin, Liu Zheng, Ren Junwei, Luo Hanchen and Koran Baike also shared the pressure for the team on the offensive end, which also gave head coach Li Chunjiang more choices.
At present, Shanghai team has an average of 6 double-figures per game, in addition to the two foreign aides, Wang Zhelin, Guo Haowen, Ren Junwei and Li Tianrong have also averaged double digits per game, which is a significant improvement over their past two seasons. Last season, Shanghai only had 4 people averaging double figures per game, except for two foreign aides, only Guo Haowen and Zong Zan scored in double figures per game; in the 2019-20 season, the first season after the Shanghai team changed owners, 6 of them scored in double figures, but 4 came from foreign aid (many foreign aides), and only Dong Hanlin and Luo Hanchen averaged double figures per game. Now, Shanghai's local squad has become more in-depth.
With a strong attack, Shanghai has won a lot of games this season. After defeating xinjiang, their ranking has risen to 3rd, second only to Liaoning and Shenzhen, and from the perspective of their second stage schedule, their schedule is not very difficult, and they have every opportunity to maintain a fairly high ranking and even continue to improve the ranking.
But if the Shanghai team wants to really show competitiveness, or if the Shanghai sharks really want to "shark back to the top", obviously there is still a lot to be done. Especially in terms of stability and the continuity of defense, they need to continue to strengthen.
In this match with Xinjiang, Shanghai did not do well, especially in the last moment. Three minutes before the final, Shanghai still led by 11 points, and Wang Zhelin, Franklin, Liu Zheng and other main players were on the field, but they were chased by Xinjiang in the last 42 seconds to only 3 points. If it were not for Xinjiang's missed key three-pointer and the last-minute steal, Shanghai would have had a harder time winning. But at that time, it was not how well the Xinjiang team played, mainly because the Shanghai team did not have enough concentration after leading, the intensity of the defensive end suddenly dropped, and the light enemy's loose mentality led to them being startled by the Xinjiang team in a cold sweat.
The overall strength of the Xinjiang team this season after Zhou Qi's departure from the team (landing in the Australian NBL League) has declined significantly, and in this game, their captain Abdul Shalamu also continued to take turns, which also caused the Xinjiang team to continue to be passive. But in the last game, they caught up with zhejiang team when they were behind by a large score, and almost reversed Zhejiang team, which has shown strength that cannot be underestimated. In this game, the Shanghai team should pay more attention to the Xinjiang team, but obviously they did not do it. Otherwise, the Shanghai team could not have been able to pull away the score difference after the Xinjiang team leaked people on the defensive end many times, so that at the last moment it was frantically counterattacked by the Xinjiang team.
Shanghai's current advantage is that they have a large number of soldiers, but they lack absolute offensive strength, especially the lack of players who can continue to score when the team is in trouble and lead the team out of the quagmire with their own strength. Franklin is not at present, Wang Zhelin and Feng Lai's performance has also fluctuated, for this reason, if the Shanghai team wants to make up for its own deficiencies, in addition to the three military life, the use of depth to fill the shortage, but also must be stronger on the defensive end, casting interlocking, more solid defensive system, and in this regard, they are now far from the top strong team is obviously still far behind, after all, the top team in addition to aggressive defense, the offensive end also has enough stability.
The reason why Shanghai head coach Li Chunjiang was able to lead Guangdong to complete the hegemony of 7 championships in 10 years in the past was that in addition to attacking, defense was also the key. After coaching the Guangsha team, Li Chunjiang once brought the team to a certain height, but the configuration of the Guangsha lineup has always been some gaps from Guangdong, and Li Chunjiang has never been able to lead the team to the top again. Now, Li Chunjiang once again has a strong and strong configuration in the Shanghai team, but if he wants to lead the team back to the peak again, Brother Chun and the Shanghai team obviously have many deficiencies to make up.