Durant stared, transfixed, at the championship banner hanging in Oracle Arena.
When they won the title last summer, everyone had thought it was only the beginning of a dynasty, the start of an era.
But now...
Durant shook his head hard. He refused to admit defeat before the game was even over.
But this game truly felt despairing.
Just then, another wave of sighs rose through Oracle Arena.
Durant looked up. Sure enough, Link had scored again.
"It's in—his 60th point of the game! Link has scored 22 points by himself so far in the fourth quarter, completely suppressing Klay Thompson's firepower! Link's scoring explosiveness is no worse than Klay's!"
Durant stared at the "60" on Link's stat line and felt strangely numb.
He was Link. Dropping 60 points was hardly difficult for him.
But when Durant glanced at the gap between the two teams, his heart ached again.
There were only 1 minute and 8 seconds left in the game, yet the Golden State Warriors were already down by 26.
After fighting for an entire quarter, the Warriors still failed to catch the Grizzlies.
Ever since Link returned to the court, Thompson's magical aura had gradually faded before vanishing altogether.
More precisely, Thompson's dominance had begun weakening from the moment Link suddenly pulled up for that ultra-deep three-pointer.
From then on, Link completely took over the game and kept scoring.
At the start of the fourth quarter, Thompson had given everyone a glimmer of hope.
But in the end, it turned out to be nothing more than an insignificant sliver of hope.
That faint light was nowhere near enough to help the Warriors pierce the darkness.
Twenty-six points... The enormous deficit left Durant deeply dejected.
Sure, he had been unable to play today because of injury, and the Warriors