The instant Vince Carter sank the shot, fans throughout Oracle Arena clutched their heads in both hands. Nearly twenty thousand people in the building seemed to be on the verge of suffocating.
Steve Kerr stared blankly at the court, as if he still could not believe what he had just seen. Was that real? The Memphis Grizzlies had actually let a nearly forty-year-old veteran take the game-winning shot. And he had fucking made it!
Kerr made sure his eyes were not playing tricks on him. The basketball had beaten the buzzer and swished cleanly through the net. Vince Carter had shaken off Livingston and knocked down an incredibly difficult jumper from the left corner.
On the court, Carter, who still had his right arm raised, was instantly swallowed up by Grizzlies players!
Link was the first to rush over. The moment he saw Carter shoot, his scalp had tingled. Forget the Warriors fans—even he had held his breath then!
And when the ball swished through the net, Link instantly lost control.
He let out a roar of "Holy shit!" and charged toward Carter, wrapping him in a tight embrace.
Then more and more people rushed over. Even Joerger and Snyder could not resist joining the celebration.
"You did it, Vince, you did it! You made the shot—we won, we fucking won! The left corner—I knew that was your territory, I knew it!" Link was so excited that his words came out in a jumble. Even when he had hit game-winners himself, he had never been this emotional.
But today, watching Carter finally break free of a nightmare that had haunted him for fourteen years, Link simply could not hold it together.
He remembered that afternoon not long ago, when Carter had told him the story of what happened in 2001.