Chapter 291 Unhappy Beginning of Year 3 (1/2)

Jamison received the pass entering the inside line and soon finished the play with a layup after protecting the ball, the opposing player risked committing a foul and thus Jamison scored the 2 points for the team Tar Heels.

Only quick plays like this bypassing Duncan in defense were most effective for Team Tar Heels, and soon after Wake Forest made another move that ended with Duncan pulling the defense for Woods to enter alone and lay up to score 2 more points.

This was the most common type of offense for the Wake Forest team, they were inside and if there were two players defending Duncan the ball would go to Woods if there was only one player scoring Duncan the ball would go for him.

It seemed simple, but it was a move that always had to be worked out and trained and depended on Duncan's talent to make it work, Jake couldn't say anything because it was the right move against Duncan.

Zwikker was a good Center, and Okulaja also did his job well as a PF, but neither had the ability to score Duncan alone in defense, so players like Duncan, Jamison, Carter, and Jake were more likely to score at the university.

In the NBA there would always be players who could take care of Duncan's defense individually and the opposing team would not have as much advantage as in this game, not to mention that the other players in the Wake Forest team also did a good job in this game.

In another move Jake was organizing the attack for the team to have Heels, after moving to the attack court he went to Jamison which was more open on the right, Jamison advanced and pass by Peral easily.

When another player arrived in defense Jamison went to Okulaja who had left the painted area to receive the ball, Duncan soon arrived in defense and Okulaja moved to Zwikker inside, Zwikker tried the mid-range shot and Woods fumbled.

Jamison tried to catch the rebound, but Duncan was quicker and took another defensive rebound for the Wake Forest team, Duncan tried to get out quickly and Jake took advantage of his careless moment to steal the ball.

Duncan did not expect to have the ball stolen on his defensive court and when he recovered he saw Jake making a dunk to score 2 more points for the Tar Heels team and the cheering crowd, soon after the game restarted again.

Jake played for the end of the first half and did what Coach Smith asked by focusing only on the two-point play, so Jake can only make a three-point play in that first half, in 7 minutes he made 9 points, 2 assists, 1 steal, and 1 rebound.

Even though not playing, as usual, Jake was the best player at the end of the first half and brought more confidence to the team that missed the least in attack and played better in defense, yet they finished the first half 7 points behind on the scoreboard.

Even though Jake played well he did not have much time to change the score of the game and Duncan was also playing well the same way, if they were playing in the same position one could restrict the other, but in different positions the two played quietly.

In the second half, Jake hoped to start playing so he could make more plays and maybe reverse the difference in the scoreboard, but Coach Smith decided to start with Ed Cota playing as PG and Williams playing as SG.

”I don't really understand what team coach Tar Heels is thinking, Jake clearly played very well in the few minutes he can play, but is he out of the team early in the second half?”

”Maybe it could be a game strategy change? Carter seems to be starting in reserve by the second half.”

”What change could be effective in this game? They could change their strategy to make more three-point play, but Jake was clearly better than Ed Cota.”

”This we will have to see in the next few minutes.”

Maybe if Jake hadn't said that to Coach Guthridge the day before, Coach Smith would have realized that this game was headed for defeat and would have let Jake play longer, but after what Jake said he couldn't stand to let him have more than 20 minutes in this game.

If it were another player who said something like that, perhaps Coach Smith would have removed that player from the team, but since Jake was one of the best players on the team, the coach could give a few punishment games at most by playing for less time.

This change made even the players of Tar Heels confused, the opponents with the full team decided to take this chance to further increase the lead on the scoreboard, was again seen the team Wake Forest dominating the game.

After 5 minutes Coach Smith took Shammond Williams to put Vince Carter in the game, but Jake didn't join him as the commentators had hoped, Jake can only come in after 10 minutes of the second half in place of Ed Cota.