On May 3, Beijing time, the other two groups of the second round of the NBA playoffs officially began, the hot digital people failed to steal a victory at the home of the Heat, and the absence of the emperor Embiid did make the digital people drop more than one notch in the interior and defense. Another group of Suns sat at home to meet the challenge of doncic's lone rangers.
The Sun, after being nearly knocked on by Booker's absence, has passed the Pelicans' difficulties, and this time it will encounter a new force. Both teams want to win their first wins today. Sure enough, at the beginning of the first quarter, the Suns, who played at home, were indeed more prepared, not only after Booker's return, but the whole team was more cohesive. In the first quarter, the Suns played well to the advantages of the combination of Booker and Ayton's inside and outside lines, frequently impacting the Lone Ranger's defense.
The Lone Rangers did see from the first quarter that the lineup facing the Suns was relatively not so calm, trailing a double-digit margin after the first quarter and ending the first quarter at 25:35. Today's Lone Ranger starters in addition to Doncic's painstaking support, the rest of the main starting players have not been able to enter the state quickly, you know this is the Western Conference semi-final stage, facing the old hot sun with Paul sitting is not allowed to have any mistakes.
At the beginning of the second quarter, the two teams are still playing back and forth, although the Lone Ranger adjusts quickly, their offense is obviously improving in this quarter, but the Suns can always give their response, whenever the Lone Ranger chases the single-digit difference, the Sun side will use a small attack wave to pull the point difference back to more than 2 digits again. Both teams played well in this quarter, the offense was smooth, and it was very enjoyable for the audience, and at the end of the second quarter, the Suns continued to lead at 34:31, winning by 3 points in the single quarter, and leading by 13 points after halftime into the second half of the showdown.
From the first half, the Suns' Ayton has a full sense of presence, not only in the interior of the defense, in the scoring efficiency, there are Booker and Paul's feeding cake, plus their own height and arm length have a good innate pie advantage, in the lone ranger's interior line to do whatever they want, defensive offense to grab.
The Lone Ranger side can only watch Doncic's shooting and fouls to help the team score, the only thing to look forward to is Kleber on the bench, if there is no stable output outside the three-point line, I am afraid that this ball would have entered garbage time at halftime. I have to say that today's two semi-finals in the East and West departments are not very suspenseful, although the backward side is struggling to chase points, but it is always unable to catch up, always pinched by the opponent, such a game naturally makes the ornamental lack of a lot.
After a brief halftime timeout in the third quarter, the Lone Ranger still couldn't find a way to turn the tables, this quarter they played harder, the hit rate has not been able to get back, the former bench bench of Dinwiddie and other crazy benches have today rested, low terrible shots, so that the basket on the court has been playing iron continuously, after the end of the quarter, the Lone Ranger continues to lag behind 23:27 by the Suns continue to expand the point difference, 17 points behind the game also lost suspense early.
In the fourth quarter, although the Lone Ranger is still trying to chase points, helplessly today's Sun in its own home field is no matter how impossible to give the victory to the opponent, whenever the Lone Ranger someone plays a good ball, there Paul and Booker immediately give a blow, accurate shooting and shooting rate let the Sun firmly hold the advantage of the point difference, slowly victory balance naturally came to the Sun side, easily won the first win in the Western Semifinals!