The small town advantage probably lies in the absence of too many paparazzi.
"I’m off!"
The two exchanged phone numbers and followed each other on Twitter and Facebook.
Before leaving, Sharapova sent a short ssage to Su Wan.
Su Wan did not reply.
A day later, the Pacers hosted the second ga of the new season; their opponent was the Miami Heat.
This would have been a major matchup last season, but this year, although David Stern had also granted it "nationwide broadcast" status, the hype was all about Su Wan’s matchup against Wade. All the dia knew that until Pat Riley got rid of Big Z, the Heat would hardly be a competitive team.
As expected, the Pacers won easily with a score of 115 to 91, dominating the Heat.
Wade’s 32 points were the only thing saving the team’s face.
Su Wan also put up 28 points, 6 rebounds, and 3 assists.
For the current Su Wan, these numbers were just a consistent performance.
But Barkley saw sothing different, "In this ga, Su Wan scored 2 more three-point shots, and the Pacers as a team had a total of 15 three-pointers... Could this season’s Pacers beco a three-point shooting team?"
That was a very strong intuition in his mind.
And soon, that intuition was confird.
The Pacers’ third ga of the new season was against:
The Toronto Raptors!
Originally this season, the Raptors were third in the Eastern Conference, with Chris Bosh, thanks to this performance, ranking seventh in the MVP standings during the regular season.
However, as the saying goes, that season in the Eastern Conference was more like a "brawl among weaklings."
With only 47 wins, the Raptors would have been sixth in the Western Conference.
And though Chris Bosh was a power forward, his style at the ti was more like that of a ball-handling small forward. Did you think his nickna "Little Garnett" was a joke? In fact, he was at one ti very close to the all-around capability of Kevin Garnett.
At least his solo team leading results weren’t inferior to Kevin Garnett’s.
Don’t say that the 03-04 Timberwolves season was a solo effort by Garnett; that would be an absolute insult to "the Alien," "Madman," "Handso Man," and "Sweet Man"!
Aside from that season, Kevin Garnett’s team-leading results weren’t much different from Chris Bosh’s, both usually exited the playoffs in the first round.
With the "Trash Brothers" as teammates, Bosh might have made it to the second round of the playoffs.
But for a ball-handling power forward without a sufficient physical presence, facing Artest could be described in two words:
A gift!
Therefore, with Chris Bosh underperforming throughout the ga, and with him as the core, the Raptors were once defeated by a margin of 30 points.
The Pacers ended up winning by about 25 points.
In this ga, they made 16 three-point shots again!
In 3 gas, the team’s total number of three-pointers made was almost reaching 50; the Pacers’ firepower from beyond the arc caught the attention of the entire League.
So dia thought this was just a temporary good phase for the Pacers.
Others believed it was the Pacers’ main strategy for the new season, showing a heavier reliance on three-point shooting.
Regardless of what the outsiders thought, the Pacers swept through the whole of November with powerful three-point shooting, boasting a 14-0 "single-month undefeated" record.
This was the first ti since the Bulls in January 1996 that a team achieved a "single-month undefeated" record.
And that year, the Bulls, with a "single-month all-win" record, ultimately achieved the best regular season record in history:
wins and 10 losses!
Could this Pacers team break that record?
Once the dia started asking similar questions, similar queries just never stopped at the Pacers’ press conferences.
Even though Su Wan said, "It’s too early to discuss this topic, the new season has just started a month ago, and our goal is the ultimate championship, compared to which everything else is unimportant," they still kept discussing the topic.
Of course, that wasn’t the only topic of interest.
There was also the reason why the Pacers were so strong this season.
All the dia inevitably ntioned the sa thing:
Three-point shooting!
Throughout November of the new season, the most noticeable thing about the Pacers was their team’s performance in three-point shooting.
In 14 gas, the Pacers were able to make an average of 11.5 three-point shots per ga.
Just from three-pointers, they scored an average of 34.5 points per ga!
How exaggerated was this data?
Known for their quick "shooting whirlwind" and team-wide three-point shooting, the Phoenix Suns were averaging only 9.5 three-point shots this season!
The Pacers were making 2 more shots per ga than them...
Of course, in terms of accuracy, the Pacers were sowhat lower, averaging 33.6%, which is 6.3% lower than the Suns’ 39.9%.
But doesn’t that precisely show how much the Pacers were focusing on three-point shooting this season?
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