Zen Master emphasized defense and reminded the players of their disastrous collapse in the final five minutes of the previous game. He urged them to stay highly alert and make absolutely sure the same thing didn't happen again.
The players all answered in unison, but sometimes things didn't go according to anyone's wishes.
When they took the court again, the Lakers tightened their defense on Wang Yi.
But that meant they inevitably had to ease up on Tagore and Zhang Yu.
So when Wang Yi passed the ball to Tagore and Zhang Yu, both of them hit their three-pointers.
And they weren't just making threes on offense.
With five minutes left, their defense suddenly shifted to a zone.
They were daring the Lakers to beat them from three-point range.
The Lakers got their chances, but Doncic was starting to run out of gas, and they couldn't capitalize from beyond the arc.
Little Rivers couldn't hit a three at this point either. King Arthur could make them, but he couldn't do it alone.
In those final five minutes, Zhang Yu and Tagore each hit two three-pointers, while Wang Yi hit one.
On the other end, the Raptors' zone defense gave the Lakers plenty of chances to shoot threes, but their percentage was clearly lower than Toronto's.
This was actually a strategy the Raptors had settled on after the first game.
At the right moments, they could give the Lakers some chances to shoot threes and challenge them to a shootout.
The Lakers were dangerous from three-point range too, but their main weapon all season had been the Triangle Offense, not the three-pointer.
The Raptors, on the other hand, had become famous this season as the Tsunami Brothers. Wang Yi in particular was absurdly good from three.
So if the teams traded