In an NBA regular season, it's rare for a player to want to throw the perfect stats, let alone the thrill of the playoffs. But today Phoenix Suns point guard Chris Paul did what it had never been before.
The future Hall of Famer scored 33 points, 5 rebounds, 8 assists and 1 steal with 100% shooting to lead the team to a 115:109 victory over the New Orleans Pelicans to advance to the second round!
Paul set a playoff all-time record for 14 consecutive hits in a single game on 14-of-14 shooting, becoming the first man of all time. (The previous record was a single-game 12-shot set by Nene during the 2017 playoff Rockets vs. Thunder.) ）
You know, Wilt Chamberlain has only achieved higher results in the regular season, once 18 of 18, and the other is 16 of 16.
During the game, Chris Paul was unaware of his feat, he just said at half-time to shoot as much as he could. Because before the game, he did not warm up for shooting.
"It's really unbelievable, you don't know how special it is for me." Paul said in an interview with the media after the game. He played his first six seasons in New Orleans and has a lot of connections to the city and this team. It's the same for Suns coach Monty.
In 2010, Monty was the manager of the New Orleans Hornets (now the Pelicans), and Paul was the "Queen Bee" at the time!
In addition to Paul's outstanding performance, their shooting guard Devin Booker magically returned this game. Previously, he missed three and a half games with a hamstring injury in the second game of the first round of the series, and he did not expect to return two or three weeks earlier than he expected.
While the All-Star had just 13 points, five rebounds and three assists on 5-of-12 shooting in 32 minutes, when the Pelicans finally launched a general offensive, they seemed ready to go into the seventh, when Booker threw a crucial three-pointer with 1:42 left in the game, and it was the ball that gave the Suns a permanent lead. Of course, it was a pass from Paul.
On the other hand, this young Pelican is not bad at beating. Their star, in particular, Brandon Ingram, has had the Suns struggling to cope with for much of the series. Opposing coach Monty Williams used a two-man bag tactic to limit him, but Ingram still got space, and he had 21 points and 11 rebounds on 8-of-17 shooting.
This is the first time in Ingram's career to play the playoffs, six games, averaging 27.0 points, 6.2 rebounds and 6.0 assists per game, and even made the series have a black nine suspense! It's really amazing, and the slam dunk believes the Pelicans definitely have a future, but it depends on the performance of their other star, Zion Williamson.
The team started the year with some talented players like Brandon Ingram, but the question everyone was thinking about was whether Zion Williamson could get back to health. The answer is a resounding "no" as Williamson missed the entire season with a broken foot. In three years of his NBA career, he played a total of 85 games. That's bad news for them.
The good news is that the Pelicans have found and acquired talent that could one day complement Williamson — Herb Jones. Through this series, the second-round rookie has proven himself to be a tough defender on the team. Plus first-round rookie Trey Murphy and lost rookie Jose Alvarado have a future to come!
But at this moment it was a night that belonged to Paul alone!
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