The first half ended with the score at 48-44.
Boston returned to the locker room trailing by 4 points. The atmosphere in the locker room was so tense it felt like it was about to explode. Pierce kicked over the tactical board, Artest, with red eyes, was breathing heavily like a trapped beast in the corner.
In the first half, they tried to destroy Jordan with physical battles, but the veteran countered with trash talk and skillful foul-drawing.
Pierce sat in front of the wardrobe, staring at his hands. Despite his best efforts to control them, his fingertips were still trembling slightly. Jordan's words, "You're scared," were like a poisoned knife, churning wildly in his mind.
He was furious, but he sadly discovered that in that suffocating, perilous situation at Tianwang Mountain, his anger truly stemmed from fear.
The second half began, and the third quarter became the turning point of the entire game.
The Lakers attempted to capitalize on Boston's mental lapse and seize the game. At the start of the third quarter, Jordan, from the left 45-degree angle, hit a fadeaway jumper despite Gary Payton's extremely aggressive defense, extending the lead to 6 points.
In the next round, Boston goes on offense.
Billups dribbled the ball across half-court, Lakers ' defensive formation was extremely tight. Pierce reached for the ball again from the right corner.
"Don't give it to him! He's already scared to death!" Lakers fans in the stands shouted scathingly taunts.
In the first half, Pierce attacked Marion three times from this position, but missed or made mistakes all of them due to impatience.
But Billups still passed the ball over.
Pierce received the ball. This time, he took a deep breath and forcefully suppressed the raging fire in his chest caused by Jordan's trash talk.
Marion was sticking close, trying to force Pierce into making a mistake.
Pierce moved, a convincing right-side pry step. Marion's center of gravity shifted instinctively by half an inch.
Just this half inch!
Pierce instantly stopped and took a vertical jump.
"Whoosh!"
A clean and crisp mid-range shot, swishing through the net.
Pierce landed, gave Marion a cold look, and then turned to retreat.
The impatience of the first half had vanished from his eyes, replaced by a chilling coldness.
Seeing this, Lin Qi was standing on the sidelines, finally relaxed his clenched fist slightly.
"It's changed," Lin Qi said softly.
It was like flipping a switch. Pierce's mid-range jumper jolted Boston awake.
Midway through the third quarter, Garnett received the ball in the paint, facing Charles Barkley's relentless defense. This time, he smoothly turned around, using Barkley's momentum, and then unleashed his signature fadeaway jumper.
The basketball arced high, sailing over Barkley's fingertips and sinking cleanly.
Then Grant Hill stepped up. He used his unstoppable first step to violently tear apart Marion's defense at the top of the key. After penetrating the paint and drawing O'Neal's help defense, instead of forcing his way in, he made an imaginative bounce pass that went between O'Neal's legs and was placed on Garnett cutting along the baseline.
Garnett catches the ball and slams it home with a powerful two-handed dunk!
In the third quarter, the Boston players transformed themselves in dire straits. They used a series of incredibly difficult yet composed shots to keep the score close.
In the final five minutes of the fourth quarter, the game turned into a fierce, close-quarters battle.
The score is tied at 91.
Both players were at their physical limits, and O'Neal was finding it increasingly difficult to maintain deep positions in the paint.
Jordan has the ball at the top of the key. At this point, his right knee is visibly stiff.
Jordan lowered his center of gravity and, with Barkley's screen, forced his way to the right.
Artest, like a raging rhinoceros, frantically came to help defend from the wing. He showed no intention of stopping; his massive body, carrying immense momentum, crashed straight into Jordan was in mid-air preparing for a layup.
"Bang!"
Jordan completely lost his balance in the air, crashing heavily to the floor like a kite with a broken string, even sliding a considerable distance across the wooden floor.
The referee's whistle blew sharply—a malicious foul!
The entire arena fell into a deathly silence. The Lakers players rushed towards Artest like madmen, and the situation nearly spiraled out of control.
In the center of the chaos, Jordan lay curled up on the floor in agony. His hands clutched his right abdomen, and cold sweat instantly beaded on his forehead.
He remained motionless, even his heavy breathing had stopped.
The team doctor, carrying a medical kit, scrambled onto the field.
" Michael? Michael!" The team doctor knelt nervously beside him, trying to examine Jordan's injury.
But just as the team doctor's hand was about to touch Jordan, Jordan struggled to raise one hand to stop the doctor's movement.
For a full two minutes, the Staples Center was so quiet that only the hum of the air conditioners could be heard. Everyone was staring at the person lying on the floor.
Finally, Jordan took a deep breath, a seemingly simple action that caused his facial features to contort in pain.
He refused the team doctor's stretcher and his teammates' help.
Jordan used his hands to support himself on the floor and slowly, with difficulty, stood up. He was still clutching his abdomen, and every step he took seemed to be accompanied by immense pain.
He walked to the free-throw line.
The entire stadium of 20,000 fans, including Lin Qi on the Boston bench, watched in awe as that figure receded from the distance.
But Jordan stepped up to the free-throw line.
He lowered his hand from his abdomen and caught the basketball the referee tossed to him. His breathing was completely erratic due to the intense pain, and his body was trembling uncontrollably.
He bounced the ball twice and adjusted his posture.
"Whoosh."
The first free throw was made.
Jordan closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and the sharp pain in his ribs made his lips twitch.
"Whoosh."
The second free throw was made.
After making those two free throws, the Lakers ' momentum reached an unprecedented peak. It was an almost tragic sense of sacredness.
In the final three minutes, despite Pierce and Garnett continuing to hit incredible shots, and despite the unprecedented resilience and determination displayed by the young Boston players.
But against Jordan, who refused to leave the court, the scales of victory ultimately tipped in his favor.
O'Neal grabbed an offensive rebound in the paint, Kidd hit a corner three-pointer.
101 to 98.
As the final buzzer sounded, the Los Angeles Lakers won a hard-fought Game 5 at home, taking a 3-2 lead in the series.
The moment the whistle blew, Jordan could no longer hold on and collapsed onto the scorer's table, his jersey already soaked with cold sweat.
We lost.
The Boston Celtics lost Game 5.
At the players' tunnel, Lin Qi stood quietly, watching his players leave the field.
Unlike their dejected state after the previous two losses, Pierce and Garnett walked off the court calmly. As they passed the scorer's table, Pierce's gaze lingered on the slumped Jordan for two seconds.
Next game, back in Boston.
That will be an ultimate, all-out battle with no way out.