76-person double super giant complex! After the All-Star Game, an anunoby was injured, the Raptors played the hottest game of 2022; the Lakers played a 27-13 offensive wave in the third quarter, and Master Huo came on to take a miracle effect, but in the end he lost again.
31 points to get the opening red! The 76ers combined to score 61 points
James Harden, who played his first game with the 76ers, finally arrived. In the away game against the Minnesota Timberwolves, Harden played 36 minutes, scoring 27+8+12 on 7-of-12 shooting, the only player in the league to have at least 25 points and 12 assists in the first game after consecutive team changes.
Joel Embiid said in a post-match interview that it was probably the first time in his career that he had won such a large vacancy. Indeed, compared to the situation before Harden, Embiid's independent Carry offensive situation, the strongest contender for this year's MVP, did play more easily in this game, and he no longer needs to do a lot of ball-carrying attacks as before. Now with Harden in place, Embiid has plenty of opportunities to easily get vacant and misplaced. In the 31st minute of playing time, Embiid cut the 34+10 data with more than 50% shooting rate, and the three-point shooting rate was as high as 60%, which can be described as both production and efficiency.
The Timberwolves Big Three have actually played very well, with the trio scoring a total of 61 points. The home team hit a 14-4 wave of attacks late in the second quarter that narrowed the gap to three points. However, faced with two league-level superstars and a flood of 76ers three-pointers (19-of-39 shooting, 49 percent from the field), the Timberwolves lost all hope of winning the game in the third quarter. 133-102, Philadelphia beat Minnesota by 31 points to get a good start to their next schedule.
End the losing streak! The Hornets beat the Raptors by 32 points
Before the All-Star Game, the Toronto Raptors achieved a wave of 7 wins and 2 losses, and the record ranking suddenly jumped to the seventh place in the East, 2.5 wins higher than the Nets in the eighth place in the East.
However, the bad news is that their starting forward, Anunoby, will miss the first game after the All-Star due to a fractured right ring finger. Head coach Nick Nas admitted at the pre-game press conference that Anunoby's injury has been around for a while, and he has been playing with injuries for a while, and he wanted to make a recovery through the All-Star period, but the recovery effect was not satisfactory.
On the other hand, their opponent, the Charlotte Hornets, have only won one game since entering February, winning the Detroit Pistons, which are still at the bottom of the league (if they don't win the Pistons, they will complete a ten-game losing streak before the All-Star Game), and they suffered a wave of three consecutive losses before the All-Star Game, so for such a team that aspires to reach the playoffs, the first game after the All-Star is particularly important for them.
The Hornets did show a very strong desire to win in the game. As soon as they started, they gave their opponents a 14-2 attack wave, and at the end of the first quarter, they had already taken a 9-point lead at home.
Charlotte has clearly strengthened their defensive intensity in this game, presumably hoping to build an edge for the team by "defending instead of attacking". The strategy did work, with the Toronto Raptors forced to take a lot of difficult ball-holding shots during the game. In the first three quarters of the opening score, the Raptors shot lower than the opponent in each quarter, especially in the second and third quarters, which were more than 20 percentage points lower than the home team, and the score was completely pulled at this stage, although the Raptors fought hard in the fourth quarter, and finally lost the game by 93-125, 32 points.
Terry Rozier showed a very strong ability to change the defense in this game. In the first three quarters of the game, he scored 21 points and 6 assists, plus or minus is also the team's highest +46, is one of the most important contributors to the Hornets to win this game.
The combination of Harrell & Ball, in this game, brought us a very big surprise. With Ball's feeding, the "best sixth man" seems to be alive again, he swept the Raptors' interior line with a destructive momentum, and with 12 shots, he scored 20 points, which is the highest scoring player on the Hornets side except Rozier and Oubre. "We tried a lot of things, and for most of AD's absence, we let James play center, but we didn't win a lot of those games and I think we need to look for a way to balance it out..."
The Clippers narrowly won! The Lakers' Los Angeles derby is hard to win
So, as Lakers head coach Vogel mentioned before the game, he did make a change and find a way to balance it. Before the Lakers' game against the Clippers, he used a new set of starts, putting Reeves, Ariza, Howard and two supernovae in the starting lineup at the same time.
The appearance of "Master Huo" really brought miracle effect to the team, in the first half of the 15 minutes of playing time, Howard scored 14 points, three blocks and 11 rebounds, including 7 rebounds in the frontcourt, completely suppressing Zubac. He is also one of the few players on the Lakers with a positive plus-minus.
However, the Lakers' performance at this end of the projection is really too poor, 12 three-point shots in the first quarter, and none of them scored. In the second quarter, it was up to the team's best "3D" player, LeBron James, to give the team a three-point shot in the bottom corner. In the first half, LeBron scored 14 points on 5-of-9 shooting, and the second half shooting rate dropped directly, less than 15%.
The Lakers didn't maintain their defensive continuity, they let their opponents score 33 points in the second quarter with 60% shooting, but they quickly corrected their defensive attitude in the second half and played a wave of 27-13 to take the lead. The two sides remained anxious since then, morris killed people from mid-range at the end of the fourth quarter, and with Anthony and James losing three-pointers in a row, the Clippers won the derby without any danger.