"8 pounds." Okafor stated succinctly.
Zhang Yang gave a thumbs up. It had been almost a month since Okafor decided to lose weight, right?
In this month, Okafor had been training and playing games with everyone every day, and without realizing it, he had lost about six or seven pounds. Little Duncan really had perseverance!
When it was the Timberwolves’ turn to attack, Randy Foye broke past Felton into the paint and passed the ball... Bynum secured his position, caught the ball, and with a high lift and shot, scored!
Losing weight wasn’t all beneficial, though. Previously, Okafor could hold off Bynum, but now he was clearly having a harder time than last season.
As the game switched to offense, Zhang Yang went one-on-one with Jaric, who maintained good tight defense.
Zhang Yang performed a rhythm-changing behind-the-back dribble, then drove through the middle. McCants shrank back, Bynum moved to the charge circle at the top of the paint, and Zhang Yang passed the ball to the right side of the restricted area.
Bynum immediately moved towards the right side of the restricted area, but he was a tad late. Okafor caught the ball, turned, and made a close jump shot!
Though Okafor had lost six or seven pounds and Bynum had increased his strength from last season, it was difficult for the former to defend the latter one-on-one.
But Okafor’s quicker playing style, lighter than before, was something Bynum couldn’t guard against either!
In the following several possessions, the teams traded scores. The Timberwolves’ offense revolving around Bynum was indeed hard to defend against, mainly because the Bobcats were unable to hold their ground under the basket. They could only resort to Hill or Millsap collapsing for help defense, which allowed guards like Randy Foye and Jaric, who both averaged 4 assists a game, to open up the team offense.
Fortunately, the Bobcats’ offense was performing well. Inability to defend wasn’t a new issue for them. They were not falling behind at the start.
After a few exchanges, Carlisle took advantage of a dead ball to substitute Perkins in, moving Okafor to power forward while Felton, Zhang Yang, and Hill continued to play.
With a clearer comparison, Carlisle realized that Okafor’s weight loss was successful, and he was fully capable of serving as a dedicated power forward.
He hadn’t noticed this before, for much the same reasons as Zhang Yang.
Another thing was that Okafor was not the kind of player who was ’fat’ in vain. He was a muscular man, and with the season being played every other day, he didn’t think Okafor would manage to lose the weight before the midpoint of the season, nor had he felt any fluctuations in Okafor’s performance due to weight loss during the games... Okafor never mentioned this!
Was it because he hadn’t lost the full 10 pounds and wanted to report it after achieving that goal? Carlisle’s feelings were quite mixed; this team oozed peculiarity at every turn...
The Timberwolves also made lineup adjustments, bringing in Sebastian Telfair and Anthony Walker. Randy Foye, McCants, and Bynum continued to play.
After the timeout, it wasn’t the Bobcats who took the lead, but the Timberwolves, who went on a 9 to 4 run!
Anthony Walker showed off his versatility—if Okafor pressed him tightly, he would drive; if Okafor backed off, he would shoot; and he was very willing to shoot, playing however he wanted.
Bynum was very familiar with this style of play, providing great support and doing an excellent job fighting for offensive rebounds.
This gave Carlisle a headache. Putting Okafor at center wouldn’t hold off Bynum, but Perkins could; Okafor at power forward couldn’t guard Anthony Walker; and if Okafor was benched, their offensive threat diminished, allowing Bynum alone to cover the basket area. The Timberwolves’ perimeter players would then be able to focus on cutting and guarding against shots...
Luckily, Zhang Yang immediately led two fast breaks. He scored one basket himself and assisted Okafor on another, closing the 5-point gap to just 1. Carlisle didn’t rush to call another timeout, deciding to see how the game would unfold.
By the end of the first quarter, Randy Foye hit a three-pointer off Anthony Walker’s assist, 32 to 26, expanding the Timberwolves’ lead to 6 points!
With 17 seconds left in the quarter, it was the Bobcats’ turn to attack. Zhang Yang, at the top of the key, took on the tightly defending Randy Foye one-on-one, breaking past him with a change of direction to the right elbow area, pulling up for a jump shot... It went in!
Just as the ball went in, the referee’s whistle blew. McCants, who had gone up to contest the shot, bumped into Zhang Yang as he released the ball, defensive foul. Zhang Yang earned an "and-one" opportunity!
With Zhang Yang making the extra point, the quarter ended at 29 to 32. The Bobcats narrowed the gap to 3 points going into the break.
Back on the bench, Felton griped, "I don’t know what’s up with our recent opponents; they all play like they’re desperate!"
Hill responded, "It’s rare for teams to get a 10-game winning streak. Once you hit 10, you can lose any time. Every opponent wants to be the one to end our streak, so they’ll definitely be giving it everything they’ve got."
Felton added, "I forgot about that, yeah. When the Suns had a double-digit win streak last season, I played really hard against them too, but we didn’t win. But I didn’t expect that after Garnett left, the Timberwolves would be stronger than last season."
Zhang Yang chimed in, "The Timberwolves actually wanted to tank last season. They let go of quite a few players in the ’06 offseason, didn’t renew Cassell’s contract, traded Banks to the Suns, and didn’t sign contracts with key bench players like Olowokandi... Instead, they kept Davis, who has a negative impact on the court."
It’s just that Garnett refused to tank and insisted on leading his teammates to win games, ending up with the Timberwolves winning over 30 games. If it weren’t for Garnett, the Timberwolves’ record last season might have been worse than the Celtics’.
They wanted to tank last season to get the top two draft picks, aiming for Oden or Durant. But having traded for Bynum, of course, they no longer wanted to tank.