by Fresh8 on Mon Nov 08, 2010 1:05 am
Chapter 17
“Allen,” Sit had asked Iverson to stay back after practice, “I wanted to talk to you about tomorrow night.”
Iverson was all ears; his time had come.
“I’m going to start you at point guard,” Sit announced, “No one else knows this. I wanted to tell you first but I need your word that you are going to do what’s best for this ball club. Your teammates need you to be more facilitator than scorer.”
Iverson was about to laugh; he’d heard this speech many times, “Yessir.”
“Don’t laugh because this is important,” Sit stated, “You know what Jason was to this team. You have big shoes to fill. Can I trust you with it?”
“Well y’know, I can play point guard too,” Iverson replied, “I’ma do what is good for this team. If you don’t think I can do it then I will prove you wrong Coach.”
Sit stuck his hand out to offer him a handshake, “We haven’t seen eye to eye on a lot since you’ve come here but I hope we’re on the same page about this. We’ve got to get the lead on the Kings in this series mate.”
Iverson reluctantly shook Sit’s hand, “Yessir.”
The first half of Game Five ended with the Kings up by 19 points. Coach Sit blasted his players in the locker room in between halves after the Stealth faithful had booed their team off the court.
“Kevin! You need to assert yourself out there!” Sit yelled.
“Andrew, move on defence!” Sit screamed.
His words were falling in deaf ears and he continued to plead with his players, “This is a joke. This is an embarassment. We didn’t come here together this far to lose on our home court. Let’s go out there and get back into this ball game!”
The Stealth rose and began to file out for the beginning of the second half. They all reached the court and the reserves took their seats on the bench. Coach Karl, Sheed and Kidd all sat down in theirs. Coach Sit pulled Durant aside near the scorers’ table away from the rest of the team.
“Kevin, I need you to play right now,” Sit stated, “No more games.”
“You can’t win without me,” Durant boasted.
“I didn’t say that,” Sit replied in disgust.
Durant shrugged and Sit gave in, “Look, you have the green light to shoot. You need to step up. Time for you to take over.”
Durant nodded, “That’s what I’m talking about.”
Sit called his players into a small huddle, “Ok, let’s get the ball to Kevin.”
Ty rolled his eyes as Sit asked for everyone to put their hands together and on the count of three, they all hollered, “Stealth!”
The Durant show was on the road again as he racked up 15 third quarter points. That push helped Seattle come back into the game behind a roaring home crowd. Aaron Karl sank back to back three pointers to tie the game at the start of the fourth quarter. Sit had Durant and Bogut on the bench. Karl had his shooting arm in the air as the Kings called a time out. Durant and Bogut both looked at Sit expecting to re-enter the game.
“Sorry guys, let’s ride out the momentum from our bench. It’s a good chance to get you guys some rest,” Sit told them.
That would cost the Stealth a win as the Kings took advantage of Seattle’s second best players being on the floor. They were soon leading by double digits thanks to some errant shots from Iverson. By the time Durant and Bogut got back on the court; it was too late. The Stealth had dropped Game Five, 108-99, and they were down in the series 3 games to 2.
* * *
Durant entered and looked around the room. The chatter died down as he was the last member of the team to arrive.
“What’s going on?” Durant asked as he took a seat at the head of the table next to Bogut.
Jao Wu and Aaron Karl were standing at the opposite end. The rookie from China and the backup point guard had called a players-only team meeting.
“No coaches here today,” Karl announced, “I think we have some things to talk about.”
Surprisingly, the rest of the team were listening.
Karl continued, “Our backs are against the wall. If we lose the next game, it’s game over.”
“When did you figure that out?” Chris Wilcox shouted out, “Even Li who speaks no English knows that!”
Karl ignored him as some of the others laughed, “Guys, J and I feel helpless watching all of you fighting and ignoring Coach. You know what he said, we didn’t come all the way here together to be eliminated by the Queens.”
“Word up!” Ariza called out.
“Thanks Trev,” Karl acknowledged him.
Ariza pointed back at him and tilted his hat forward a bit more.
“This isn’t what we stand for here,” Karl said, “Ever since I’ve played for this team, I know that we play for each other. I know we all got out own personal agendas but I think that we all play for each other at the end of the day.”
Wu added, “No matter what we all want to do, I think we all got to be on the same page tomorrow. When it’s game time, I think it’s time we win game six. We got to force a game seven. We have to do it for Jason.”
Durant looked around and couldn’t see Kidd as Wu was speaking, “Aaron and I didn’t really know what we could have done. We both think Coach deserves more respect than you guys are giving him. It’s about time we all got back onto the same page. Let’s give it our best shot tomorrow.”
Durant spoke up, “As long as y’all know that this is my team.”
He looked around and everyone had focused their attention on him, “All of y’all know you can’t win without me. I’m going to need your support too though.”
He turned to Bogut, “My man, we gonna tear it up tomorrow?”
Bogut gave him a high five, “Let’s bring the series back to Seattle.”
The rest of the team began to get excited. Aaron and Jao gave each other high fives too. Ty watched his teammates smiling and joking again; this time he was going to try hard not to have any bones to pick over with Durant. He got up and walked over to him.
Ty extended his hand, “Man, no more fighting. This might be the last few times we play together. Let’s go out strong.”
Durant squeezed Ty’s hand as firmly as he could in a show of ‘dominance’, “I’m doing this for Jason because he’s my man. Don’t feel like I’m doing any favours for you.”
Ty was sickened by his ego, “Don’t worry. You will always be a tool.”
Durant was in top form for the Stealth but Moses Chara and the Kings still led 47-42 at halftime. The Kings crowd was hostile as ever and Sit knew that he needed to get the best out of his players in order for them to upset the Kings on their home floor. Durant had earned the temporary trust of Sit again by apologising to him during the plane ride to Sacramento. Sit had instructed his star player to take over in the second half. Russell Westbrook was once again embarrassing his team so Sit decided to switch his team’s defence to a full court press. Seattle came back into the second half focused as ever. The press forced all sorts of turnovers and Durant was great as he outplayed the League MVP Chara. Soon, Seattle was in the lead for the first time in the game thanks to their 27-13 third quarter. Ty had a steal and dunk before driving in and scoring a layup on the next possession. Durant followed that up with a three point play near the end of the third quarter. That gave Seattle their biggest lead of the night with 9 points.
“Come on Stealth!” Sit shouted out at his team, “We can win this one!”
The Kings pulled it back to a 4 point ball game at 74-70 thanks to a Westbrook dunk. That had Sit covering his eyes as the player he had traded away continued to roll towards a double double. Sit called a time out to talk it over with his guys.
“Don’t let him drive in like that!” Sit said, “It’s embarassing.”
Sit said to Ty before he returned to the court, “Take the ball to the rack.”
Ty responded with back to back dunks. Durant surprisingly fed Ty the ball after attracting the double team. Ty took a shot from way down town and it was good. An 81-76 score line was encouraging for Seattle as they entered the final stretch of the game. Durant extended the lead to 7 points with a coast to coast dunk off a defensive rebound. Durant ran back down the court with both arms in the air as the Kings fans were silenced. After a Kings timeout, a comeback would see them cut the lead to 2 points off a Chara three pointer. However, that wouldn’t last long as a Bogut midrange jumper and a Durant three pointer would push the Seattle advantage back up to 6 points at 89-83. Durant’s trey was sweet given that he had scored it in Chara’s face. Chara had missed a shot on the other end before this one; giving Durant even more reason to boast as the Kings called timeout.
“You see that? Ain’t got nothing on me,” Durant taunted Chara as the players returned to their benches.
Durant ended up icing the game by scoring his team’s final 4 points and the score for Game Six ended up at 93-90 thanks to Al Jefferson’s ‘consolation basket’ at the buzzer. Durant finished with 34 points and the win. The series was tied up and it would all end in Seattle. It was going to be one helluva night in Game Seven – one team was going to the NBA Finals and the other one would be devastated with the outcome.
* * *
“This is what we do!” Sit was trying to be heard above all the ruckus, “How many times does a series come down to a Game Seven?! This is what will define us. When we are all retired from the game, this is what people will remember us. But they will only remember us if we win!”
Durant wanted to rally his guys as well, “We’ve got to keep the season alive! We’ve got to win that ring!”
“Win for me guys!” Kidd shouted as the players all put their hands in the air together, fingers pointing to the sky, “One, two, three...”
“Stealth!”
The crowd cheered and began to chant, “Kevin’s team, Kevin’s team!” The Stealth players lined up at half court. Iverson had been chosen to start again at point guard after leading Seattle splendidly in Game Six. He jumped up and down on the spot to try and loosen up. The Kings starters came onto the floor. None of the players acknowledged each other; there was a lot of bad blood between the teams. This was going to be brutal. The ball went up and Jefferson won the tip. Moses Chara made his intentions known as he scored the first bucket. It was a rare dunk from the League MVP.
The first quarter ended with the Kings up 28-21. They had started the game with a 14-4 run before the Stealth settled down and began working their way back into the game. The first half was an uphill struggle as Seattle were chasing the Kings the rest of the way. The second quarter saw them continue to play catch up. The breakthrough came as Ty’s dunk with 40 seconds left in the half tied the game at 49-49. Seattle’s fans were ecstatic and Chara called a time out.
“We’ve let the lead slip away,” he barked at his teammates, “Come on now. Let’s play with some fucking brains out there!”
Sit smiled as he saw Chara losing his cool. He couldn’t tell what was going on but he could see that he was frustrated. Sit had made some adjustments to his team’s strategy. They were playing a zone and double teaming Chara every time he had the ball. As halftime approached, Chara had scored 18 points but he was seemingly getting more and more frustrated as he clearly had to work harder for his buckets. However, not everything was going in Seattle’s way. Ty had played limited minutes due to foul trouble. The Stealth were relying too much on Durant to keep them in the game. He had 16 second quarter points and Bogut had most of the rest. Sit needed the rest of the team to step up.
“Let’s go into the half ahead of these guys!” Chara demanded from his teammates as they returned to the floor.
Sacramento ended the half up 54-49 thanks to a Chara triple and a Westbrook dunk.
Marv Albert and Reggie Miller were calling the game from the sideline. Craig Sager was in his Willie Wonka-esque suit somewhere out in the hysteria of the Seattle home court. Albert and Miller watched on as the Kings built a 15 point lead by the middle of the third quarter.
“Some terrible shot selection from the Stealth has seen them drop behind by double digits here in the third quarter,” Albert narrated as the home team called a time out, “Reggie, there has been some bad luck for Seattle.”
Miller elaborated, “Yes Marv. That fourth personal on Tyson has got to hurt Seattle. He hasn’t played much tonight because of foul trouble. It’s always bad for any team to lose a player of his calibre. This is why they are down by so many points. The Kings seem to want it more than them.”
“In all of your time following the game, have you seen anyone like Moses Chara?” Albert changed the topic; Chara had 24 points and was about to take a seat.
“Marv, Moses Chara is one of a kind. He doesn’t need to score big points to help his team win. Everyone knows how dangerous he is with his shot and even when they deny him the shot or tonight like how the Stealth have dared him to shoot, he always finds a way to win.”
The teams got back into it and it wasn’t long before Durant had scored 8 of his 10 third quarter points to help Seattle cut back Sacramento’s lead. With the score 78-71, the Kings called another time out with a minute remaining in the quarter. Interestingly, Chara didn’t return to the floor. The rest of the quarter was one that Sit would rather not have witnessed. The strength of the home crowd was broken as Jerry Stackhouse rose to the challenge of keeping the Kings ahead by hitting three big shots. The first shot was a jumper off an Al Jefferson kickout.
“And it’s good!” Marv exclaimed, “Stackhouse sinks the open jumper.”
The second one was a pull up three pointer with no one in sight.
“Stackhouse delivers with a three point dagger! The Kings are up by 12 points!”
The third created the biggest reaction from Albert and silenced the Stealth fans. Stackhouse caught the ball at the top of the key and dribbled right. He couldn’t shake Trevor Ariza and so he stepped back and put up the shot.
“Stackhouse with another three!” Marv yelled.
Reggie was equally excited, “What an amazing sequence! Nothing can go wrong for Sacramento. Jerry Stackhouse must really want that NBA ring.”
As the third quarter came to a close, Sit looked up at the scoreboard. 86-73. At this stage, his guys were tired and downtrodden. Although Durant was winning his scoring battle with Chara, outscoring Chara 32-24, the Stealth were behind by a sizable margin. Time was running out. Only a miracle would save the 2012-13 NBA season for the Seattle Stealth.
Plus I'm on Xbox... a lot harder to arrange these things.
Honestly, this looks pretty much over for the Stealth.
