Chapter 529 - The Season Continues 9 (2/2)

After the end of the game the Los Angeles Lakers team traveled to downtown Cleveland, Ohio which was where the next game would be, the players arrived at the hotel and could rest well because the Lakers team would not have a game the next day.

The beginning of this month of March was being very good for the teams that sometimes had 1 day for the players to rest between games, the teams still had a difficult and tiring sequence with many games, but it was better than in the month of February.

The other day the players just did a short training and so they would be more rested for the next game, then the day of the next game came that would be against the Cleveland Cavaliers team.

The Cleveland Cavaliers team was having a regular season with 10 wins and 10 losses in 20 games, even though the Cleveland Cavaliers team was playing at home, everyone thought the Los Angeles Lakers team would win that game.

Jake remembered that in this game the Los Angeles Lakers team lost in his past life, so he would not underestimate the opponent, but Jake thought that if he played well the Los Angeles Lakers team would still win.

The game started with the Cleveland Cavaliers team pressing in the attack and showing that they wanted to win, the Los Angeles Lakers team also pressing in defense as they did in every game and the game was even.

At the end of the first quarter, the Cleveland Cavaliers team was winning a small 2 point lead, in the second quarter Jake started trying more attacking moves and more steals too and he was helping in defense.

So in the second quarter, the Los Angeles Lakers team ended up winning, and in the third quarter too, at the end of the game, the Los Angeles Lakers team won the game with 108 points against 96 points of the Cleveland Cavaliers team.

This game was more difficult because only Shaquille O'Neal and Jake were playing well in that game, Shaq had 37 points and 19 rebounds and 5 blocks and had one of his best this season, Jake double-double with 32 points and 10 assists.

Dennis Rodman did not play again in that game and Coach Rambis seemed uncomfortable with it, Jake had a different contract that allowed him to miss some training and even lose some games and even then Jake did not use this benefit and asked Coach Rambis when he needed to miss training.

Kobe Bryant was not playing very well in that game and had 14 points and Rick Fox was also not playing very well and had 12 points, even so, the Los Angeles Lakers team managed another victory and that made the players happier.

After that game, the team traveled to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where they would play the next game, this time the players would not have 1 day off because the next game would be the next day.

The other day the Los Angeles Lakers team went to the First Union Center to face the Philadelphia 76ers, the other players and even coach Rambis were not concerned with that game because the Los Angeles Lakers team had lost just one game that season.

But Jake knew that the Philadelphia 76ers team was probably the toughest opponent that the Los Angeles Lakers team this season, the Lakers team would have lost 8 games this season if Jake had not been on the team.

So even though they now had 24 wins and only 1 loss it was because Jake had joined the Los Angeles Lakers team, only Jake knew the real difficulty of the games and that game would be very difficult.

The Philadelphia 76ers team had 13 wins and 9 losses this season which was already very good, and they had 3 games less than the Los Angeles Lakers team, in Jake's past life these two teams had similar results in the season.

The Philadelphia 76ers team still had Allen Iverson who was a great Jake idol in the NBA, Allen Iverson is one of the best players in NBA history, this February Allen Iverson would be the player of the month if Jake was not chosen.

Allen Iverson would also be the player with the most points per game this season, Jake would probably be the player with the most points this season, so Jake was looking forward to this game and knew that all players would have to play very well for the team to win.

Jake even talked to Kobe before the game to ask Kobe to let him defend against Allen Iverson in that game, Jake knew that Allen Iverson would score a lot in that game and only he could help in the defense to prevent Allen Iverson from scoring so many points.

Ideally, Jake would suggest this to Coach Rambis, but Jake had a good friendship with Kobe and didn't want to do that without talking to him before, unfortunately Kobe was very confident that he could defend well against Allen Iverson and did not accept Jake's suggestion.