The Pelicans Five Tigers bombarded 79+25, the Suns Big Three lost the card battle by 81 points, and the Lakers' expectations were disappointed!
Text: Lao Kan Kanqiu
Editor|Lao Kan Kanqiu
On April 8, Beijing time, the NBA regular season ushered in the Western focus battle, and the Phoenix Suns sat at home to face the New Orleans Pelicans. Prior to this game, the Suns had a 46-31 record and three straight wins to sit sixth in the West, while the Pelicans had a 45-32 record and suffered four straight losses and finished seventh in the West. This will be the third meeting between the two sides this season, the first two meetings, the winner is the Suns, following last season's meeting, Booker has scored 50+ points against the Pelicans in three consecutive games, which can be called the Pelican killer. Therefore, before the game, the well-known American media ESPN gave a winning rate prediction that the Suns had a winning rate of 65.8% and the Pelicans had a winning rate of 34.2%.
In fact, the Suns' situation has not been optimistic, the rest of the schedule is all the top eight in the West, and they are very important about winning and losing, and every game is a tough battle. In the face of the devil's schedule, the Suns have stubbornly beaten themselves into devils, and they have won three consecutive victories, and the whole team is relieved. However, if the team does not want to fall into the play-off quagmire, they still cannot afford to take it lightly and need to keep winning. Mainly because there is a strong opponent behind them, that is, the Lakers led by James, who have won 9 wins and 1 loss in the past 10 games, and have rushed into the top eight in the West, only 1.5 wins away from the Suns.
The same is true for the Pelicans, who have plummeted from fourth place in the West to seventh place in the West after Ingram's injury, and are only 0.5 wins away from the Lakers behind them. In the last game against the Spurs, they once established a 15-point lead, but were eventually reversed by Wembanyama, which was a very big blow to the team's morale, and the whole team urgently needed a hearty victory to get out of the decline.
In terms of injuries, Damion Lee is absent on the Suns' side, and the starting five are: Devin Booker, Bradley Beal, Grayson Allen, Kevin Durant, Youssef Nurkic. The Pelicans' Ingram is out, Zion, Alvarado, Marshall are doubtful, and the starting lineup is: CJ McCollum, Jones, Trey Murphy III, Zion, Valanciunas.
At the beginning of the first quarter, Valanciunas scored a two-point shot for the Pelicans to take the lead, Booker also had two points, and Beal hit a three-point shot at the top of the arc, and the Suns opened the game with a 9-4 advantage. Zion responded with four straight points on a basket, Durant and Allen hit back-to-back three-pointers, and with Booker hitting both free throws, the Suns had stretched the margin to 12 points. McCollum hit a key three-pointer to score eight straight points to stop the bleeding and end the first quarter with the Suns leading by seven points at 26-19.
Back in the second quarter, Zion threw after breaking through, Murphy III skated and dunked in the air, the Pelicans hit a 12-2 offensive climax to chase 3 points, or Zion's side chased the big hat Nurkic, Murphy hit a three-pointer again, and the Pelicans had tied the score. Allen hit a long-range three-pointer, and Durant broke through and hit a jumper to stabilize the situation temporarily. McCollum's three-point shot at the top of the arc is still up and down, and he has now scored 21 points, Alvarado also hit three consecutive points to become the Pelicans in this game, Durant broke through to the inside, jumped high to complete a one-arm glide split dunk to stop the bleeding in time, and at halftime, the Suns trailed by 6 points at 50-56 and lost by 13 points in a single quarter.
McCollum had 21 points and 3 rebounds on 8-of-12 shooting in the first half, Zion had 9 points, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and 1 block, Durant was 4-of-12 with only 9 points, 3 rebounds and 4 assists, Booker had 11 points and 4 assists, and Beal had 10 points and 4 assists. Yibian fought again, Zion nailed the board big hat Bill, and then McCollum chased down and hit his sixth three-pointer, Beal and Durant took turns hitting three-pointers in response, the Suns narrowed the gap to 5 points, McCollum flanked the long-range three-pointer, Durant turned over and made a jumper, and then scored three points in the bottom corner, the two sides launched a big battle, Zion jumped high to snatch the ball back from Eubanks, hit the board, and after the third quarter, the Suns still trailed by 7 points at 83-90.
In the fourth quarter, Beal hit a three-pointer from the bottom corner and scored 8 points in a row to help the Suns chase down to 2 points to stop the Pelicans. After the timeout, the Pelicans' offense still did not improve, Beal hit a dry jump shot again, the score of the two sides was tied, and the game entered the white heat in advance, Nurkic stealed, assisted Beal to hit a 3-pointer again, Zion responded with a layup, and the two sides alternated leads. Then it was Zion, who chased down the big hat Beal and then countered and glided for a layup. Booker broke through and played hard to make it 2+1, Zion continued to dribble under the crotch and then pulled dry, and then sent Durant a hot pot hat, and then went inside to complete a one-arm split, and the Pelicans led to 6 points. In the end, the Pelicans defeated the Suns 113-105, the two sides had the same record, the Pelicans temporarily ranked 7th in the West, the Suns ranked 6th in the West, the Western pattern changed greatly, the Pelicans failed to lose, and the Lakers regretted that they could not lie directly in the seventh place in the West, and their expectations were disappointed!
In terms of data, on the Suns' side, Beal shot 13 of 19, including 7 of 8 three-pointers, 33 points, 3 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 blocks, Durant 23 points, 4 rebounds and 6 assists, Booker was no longer magical, cut 25 points and 7 assists, and the Suns Big Three scored 81 points and 18 assists;