Mountain Peak System: a Path to NBA

Chapter 838 838: Epilogue · Seven Years · One_2

However, Qin Yue still couldn't leave the Great Qin Center with a smile that night.Because at the Great Qin Center, the Lakers, with a full team effort, laughed to the end with a score of 121 to 117.

"I know I'm old and decrepit," Kobe joked at the press conference, "but don't forget, my teammates are all younger than me."

This game, whether it was Kobe's post-game response or the final result of the game, made it impossible for Qin Yue to feel any joy.

"During that time, he almost couldn't sleep every night," Ronnie Evans said years later when reminiscing, "He would often come knocking on my room door in the middle of the night, asking, 'Ronnie, why did we lose that game?'

Although from Evans' few words, people later only sensed a Qin Yue who was more eager for victory than anyone, and who would still try to win the next game even after laughing to the last time and time again.

But for the already four-time champion Warriors...

Qin Yue's personal will was precisely the key that distinguished them from other dynasty teams.

"No team can achieve a perfect record in the regular season."

Charles Barkley, who knew Qin Yue and the Warriors best on TNT TV, said, "So, of course, the Warriors would lose some games in the regular season, but what surprised me was that even after winning the championship for four consecutive years, this team still maintained an ambition far beyond other teams."

In competitive sports, there are countless cases of dynasty collapses due to a decline in ambition.

But the Warriors led by Qin Yue seemed to become that exception.

Externally, Qin Yue's competitiveness would drive the entire team to go all out in one game after another.

Internally, the personnel transition from the "2.0" to "3.0" phase of the Warriors this season was also one of the reasons why this champion team could consistently maintain its ambition.

The young Jimmy Butler, after two seasons of honing, had officially launched a strong challenge to his predecessor Gerald Wallace.

Additionally, Draymond Green, unwilling to be subordinate to Kwame Brown, also demonstrated his ambition to "replace and surpass" in many games.

"Throughout the 13/14 season, there was healthy competition within the team at multiple positions."

Warriors head coach Mike Malone recalled, "These competitions energized us and made us a team that, in the eyes of the world, could never be satisfied."

As time entered April of this year, the Warriors, having already won four consecutive championships, finished their entire regular-season journey with a record of 70 wins and 12 losses.

This record not only made them the first team in NBA history to win 70 or more games in three consecutive seasons.

Moreover, the Warriors, who could never be satisfied, also secured the regular-season top spot in the league for five consecutive years with their impressive regular-season record.

This season, Qin Yue, playing all 82 regular-season games, delivered a "30+" triple-double stat line of 35.4 points, 15.8 rebounds, 10.1 assists, 3.8 blocks, and 1.5 steals per game, and was named the regular season's scoring leader, rebound leader, and block leader.

"The Warriors are launching an unstoppable assault on the championship for the fifth consecutive time," ESPN evaluated the Warriors this season before the playoffs started, "In the West, maybe only the Lakers can cause them some trouble."

Entering the playoffs, the Warriors' first opponent was the Clippers.

Notably, before this series started, Baron Davis from the Clippers was invited by the Warriors' management to visit the "Original Bearded Man" exhibit next to the Great Qin Center.

However, once on the court, Davis's fond memories of the Warriors 1.0 era were quickly swept into the "trash can" by Qin Yue and the Warriors players on the court.

After four games, the Warriors smoothly advanced to the next round with an overwhelming average winning margin of 25 points against the Clippers.

"We were completely stunned," Clippers' top star Blake Griffin said in an interview, "Many times, we didn't even know what to do on the court. In front of the Warriors, we seemed like a group of confused rookies."

In the upcoming Western Conference Semifinals, the Warriors faced the challenge of the Mavericks.

In these two years, with Jason Kidd's retirement and Terry's departure, perhaps only Nowitzki's loyalty to Dallas continued to support his championship pursuit.

Although now King Nowitzki still had Tyson Chandler and Tony Parker as his left and right arms, against the Cosmic Warriors led by Qin Yue, it was destined that the past-peak Nowitzki couldn't change the objective strength gap between the Mavericks and the Warriors.

Four games.

Four defeats to the Warriors.

At the Dallas American Airlines Center, when all Mavericks fans realized that the tracks of the German War Chariot had irreversibly begun to rust, even the harshest Mavericks fans wouldn't bear to criticize the man who was still trying to win a glimmer of hope for the Mavericks until the last moment.

There's no way around it, this is the cruel and merciless nature of competitive sports.

Some heroes age.

And some are in their prime.

Under Qin Yue's leadership, the Warriors advanced to the Western Conference Finals for the fifth consecutive year.

Additionally, in the regular-season awards selection this season, the Warriors also emerged as the top winners.

Qin Yue was elected the NBA's regular-season MVP for the fifth consecutive year.