Training for the Movie
The other day Jake was training even more willingly and had also returned to running training for marathons and also for the 10,000 meters sport, as he was in his best physical condition he trained as well as before traveling to Tokyo.
If Jake had not told Coach Davis that he had not trained since the marathon, Coach David would have thought that Jake had trained while in Miami, after all, Jake went almost two weeks without training and should have performed poorly.
That way he could understand why Jake wanted to increase the intensity of his training and why Jake didn't mind trying to train when he was in Miami, he knew it wouldn't make much difference and so he didn't even try.
In the training of the Tar Heels team Jake also tried harder than in other training and this encouraged his teammates to train more, Jamison and Williams even played well in the last game, but Carter failed to perform well and hindered the team.
This left Coach Guthridge more relaxed because he realized that the players were becoming inattentive in the games, he was also happy to see that he could count on Jake again and would have no problems until the end of the season.
Even though Tar Heels fans and the media had already forgotten that Jake had not participated in a game, the companies that negotiated to sponsor him had not forgotten, with the Lakers' team David Falk had already closed a verbal agreement.
The Lakers were also close to closing the deal with the Los Angeles Clippers team, Nike had no longer responded to David Falk's request for a better contract, but Adidas was still negotiating and was close to agreeing with Jake's requests.
This made Jake happier with Adidas, he remembered that many times players had career crises and needed the support of sponsors at that moment to be able to recover more easily.
This time Jake had not participated in just one game in which his team had won and yet several companies gave up on having an agreement with him, only the companies David had contacted before they continued with the verbal agreement.
If the Tar Heels team won the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament Jake was sure that these companies would try again for a contract, at that moment Jake would ask for a contract with a much higher value to accept those companies that had given up.
Jake knew he had the skills and when he arrived in the NBA, the companies that trusted him and bet on him would have a lot of return in the few years of the contract, and Jake didn't need the money and just wanted to be recognized for his work as a professional player.
While Jake thought about concentrating fully on training his racing and basketball team, something he had forgotten came back to take him by surprise, one of the members of the film he was going to participate in a few months had come to the university.
Because of university and also the games with the Tar Heels team that basketball season Jake had to join the film crew for The Matrix a few weeks later, and because of that and because his character had many martial arts scenes that required training to make the film's directors the Wachowskis asked to send someone to teach him martial arts while he was at university.
Jake had naturally accepted it because the Wachowskis were already making an exception by accepting that he later joined with the other actors on the film crew, so fight choreographer Yuen Woo-ping was sent to train with Jake.
Jake knew many films that Yuen Woo-ping participated in, after all, Jake was a fan of many martial arts films, but Jake didn't know exactly what he would learn, he knew that it was not any real martial arts but only to fight in the filming.
This did not mean it was easier to learn even if it wasn't an original martial art made for self-defense, then if Jake spoke to Yuen Woo-ping a little he learned that it would be more difficult than he thought because he would have to train with cables wires and he would have to do stunts in the air with safety equipment.
Talking to Yuen Woo-ping, Jake learned that many actors ended up getting hurt when doing training in both fight training and cable acrobatics, Jake was confident that his body was much stronger than normal actors, but he still would be careful.
Because of that, Jake would have to stop doing running training again because he couldn't stop going to classes and neither could go to training with the basketball team, as they didn't have the necessary equipment to do the stunts and training in Corporal Jake would learn all the technique and fighting movements before.
Later, when he could leave the university, they would train what Jake had learned in the cables and learn the necessary stunts, as Jake would be the one who needed to fight more in the film, his training would have to be more intense.
The other actors had already been trained by Yuen Woo-ping and so he was worried about what Jake's training would be like, it was usually supposed to be easier because Jake was an athlete, but Jake was too tall and that could make it difficult for him to learn the skills techniques.
After all, Jake was 2.01 m and was 15 cm taller than Keanu Reeves, in addition, Jake with 19 years old had a body with many muscles and even if he was not exaggerated it could affect his agility and balance.
The other actors have been through martial arts training for more than 3 months with him and worked hard, but he would have less time to train with Jake because he still had to play basketball games during training.
In the early days, he would just teach Jake some martial arts moves, so he could learn the moves that would be used in the fights, the moves were real martial arts even if the fights were choreographed.
So after a day of training with Jake, Yuen Woo-ping totally changed his mind and started to think that training with Jake would be much easier than he thought, Jake also concentrated and devoted himself a lot to learn the movements as well as the other actors.
But Jake learned the movements much more easily than the others, in a few hours he could do almost the same thing as Yuen Woo-ping who was teaching him and with the same agility as him.
This left Yuen Woo-ping pleasantly surprised and so he managed to teach Jake even more things from day one, on the second day of training Jake continued to learn quickly, Yuen Woo-ping realized that this way Jake would take less than 2 months to learn everything that the other actors learned over 3 months.
Jake also enjoyed learning martial arts with Yuen Woo-ping and was excited about the film, but they had to stop training the other day because the Tar Heels team's next game had arrived.
Jake had also put a lot of effort into training with the basketball team for this game, his teammates were also dedicated and were more confident for this game.
This would be another game at home at the Dean Smith Center which gave a great advantage and confidence to the players of the Tar Heels team, the opponent of that game was the Wake Forest team which, even though it was not doing so well in the season, was a difficult opponent for the Tar Heels team.
The media spoke again before the game as Team Wake Forest had been the last team that managed to defeat Team Tar Heels last season if Team Wake Forest won that game the media would be very excited about the reports they could do.
Of course, Coach Guthridge and not even the players on the Tar Heels team wanted to lose this game, besides Jake and Jamison Coach Guthridge was also one of the most praised, at the beginning of the season nobody believed he was able to replace Coach Dean Smith with the same quality.
But in his first season as head coach, the Tar Heels team had not lost a game and they were the favorites to win the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament again.
"Welcome to everyone who came to follow this game of the basketball season at the ACC conference, today the Tar Heels team will play against the Wake Forest team."
"The Tar Heels team has been getting better and better with an incredible streak of victories for over 1 year without losing a game, Jake and Jamison have been playing very well this season too and they are the favorites to win again today."
"But the Wake Forest team came to win in this game, they are the last team that defeated the Tar Heels team before starting this sequence of victories and they want to win today again."
"It's true, the Tar Heels team is the favorite to win that game today, but if the players on the Tar Heels team perform as badly as they did in the last game it will be difficult for them to win again depending on Jake."
Just as commentators said everyone's concern was the performance of the Tar Heels team players, but Coach Guthridge was confident that the players would perform well because they trained hard in the past few days.
Shammond Williams, who was playing well in the last few games, was sent to defend against Tony Rutland, Jake was defending against Robert O'Kelley, so the two main players of the Wake Forest team on the three-point line would be scored.
Right at the beginning of the game, Jake took the Tar Heels team to press on the attack, in the last game he had already seen that they didn't lose because they made a very good 1st half and the opposing team took a long time to recover and so Jake managed to guarantee the victory for the Tar Heels team.
Jake advanced with the ball and passed to Vince Carter on the left before passing through the middle of the court, Carter did not play well in the last game and was not satisfied with his performance this season.
He didn't have any games this season when he had a great highlight making many points just like Antawn Jamison and Williams had, with Jake so he couldn't even compare himself.
Carter praised her for his performance in several games that helped the team win and in defense too, but he still wanted to have a game scoring more than 35 points as his teammates.
Even if he didn't succeed, he at least wanted to play well for the next games until the end of this season, after all, he was thinking about joining the NBA draft this year and this would be his last season for the Tar Heels team.
Carter came forward and passed the ball to Jamison later on the left, Jamison tried to get rid of the opposing defense, but had to stop and pass the ball to Okulaja on the left, Okulaja received the ball and passed it to Jake further back.
Jake received the ball and pretended he would try a shot from the outside and advanced with the ball, Jake used his agility and drive to the basket by doing a dunk after passing through all the opposing players on the way and making the first 2 points for the team Tar Heels.
Jake was considered a complete player because he could score points on three-point shots and he could also make dunk and layup move with ease, Wake Forest team players were not intimidated and tried to attack.
Jake and Williams were defending against the best players on the Wake Forest team outside the three-point line, and Jake was still on the lookout for players who were inside the three-point line if he had the chance Jake would try a steal.
After a good move, the ball went to Rutland who was being defended by Williams, Rutland made a feint and managed to take a step back and was free to make the shot from outside to make three more points for the Wake Forest team.
After 10 minutes of the 1st half everyone had already realized what was going on in the game, the Tar Heels team players again were not performing well and only Williams was playing better.
But the players of the Wake Forest team were also not playing well and the defense of the Tar Heels team was putting pressure, so the players of the Wake Forest team were having trouble getting the points.
Jake was playing as well as ever and had already scored 11 points and was helping the Tar Heels team to be winning with a good advantage on the scoreboard, in another play Jake managed to make a steal intercepting a pass from the Wake Forest team.
Jake did not use speed and advanced slowly so that his teammates could move forward, after passing through the middle of the court Jake passed the ball to Williams on the right.
Williams advanced the ball to the three-point line and passed to Okulaja further on, Okulaja passed to Jamison on the left and Jamison tried to advance to make a layup, but the Wake Forest defense pressed against him and Jamison had to pass the ball to Jake further back.
Jake held the ball and made a high pass to Carter who took the ball high and made a dunk to complete the alley-oop and make 2 more points for the Tar Heels team, no one saw Carter coming behind the defense of the Wake team Forest and he managed to dunk easily.
Jake trained a lot with Jamison and Carter in the basketball team's training because the two were his best friends on the team, but in the game, he did most of the assists for Jamison who was playing better.
Carter was not upset because he knew Jamison was playing better than he was, but to make up for Jake he just made plays like this with Carter who was better at dunking, so the most beautiful moves Jake made with Carter.
With the Tar Heels team pressing in attack and defense, the 1st half ended with the Tar Heels team winning with a good advantage against the Wake Forest team, the best players of the Wake Forest team failed to score much with Jake and Williams defending against them and Jake still got a lot of steals.
In this 1st half of the game Jake played for 20 minutes and made 17 points, 4 assists, 4 rebounds, 6 steals, and 2 blocks, Jake got 2 more blocks in that game defending against O'Kelley, in his last 5 games Jake got blocks in all games playing against good opponents.
"And so the 1st half of the game ends, the Tar Heels team is winning the game with a good advantage as expected, Jake is playing well in attack and also in defense, but not as well as in the last game."
"The players of the Tar Heels team are not performing as well as in the last game and that worries the fans and coach Guthridge, soon the ACC tournament will start and the Tar Heels team will not be able to lose any more if they want to become the champion."
"Fortunately in this game, the players of the Wake Forest team are not playing as well as the last opposing team of the Tar Heels team, so I find it difficult for the Tar Heels team to lose that game with an advantage like that in the 1st half."
Just as commentators said, fans were not too concerned after seeing the 1st half because the Wake Forest team players were not playing very well and Jake was doing well as always.
Coach Guthridge was concerned about the upcoming games as well as commentators and sports media, but he saw how the players trained hard in the past few days and were not relaxing at the games.
It looked like it was just bad luck that the Tar Heels team players were going through, Coach Guthridge just hoped that this bad luck would end before the ACC tournament started.
The Wake Forest team that was losing the game started pressing in the attack against the Tar Heels team, the players of the Tar Heels team were focused on the defense and Williams was defending against Rutland.
Jake was defending well against O'Kelley who managed to make only 6 points in the 1st half, but Williams was not so well and the Wake Forest team started trying to attack more with Rutland because of that.
In another play, the Wake Forest team made a good play and Rutland received the ball, he made a feint and Williams was deceived, but Rutland did not attempt the shot and passed it to O'Kelley who was far from where Jake was.
O'Kelley attempted the three-point shot and Jake arrived quickly and hindered O'Kelley's attempt, so he missed and Jamison caught the rebound for the Tar Heels team, Jake was always aware and was at a distance that he could try the steal and also hinder O'Kelley.
Jamison passed the ball to Jake who advanced for the attack, after passing through the middle of the court Jake passed the ball to Williams on the right, Williams was playing well in the game and had already scored 9 points in the 1st half and hoped to help the team more in attack as he was having difficulty defending.
Williams passed the ball to Carter from the left before crossing the three-point line, Carter advanced and tried to get rid of the defense and managed to get past one until another opposing player appeared to defend.
Carter stopped and passed the ball to Jamison who was on the left, Jamison passed the ball to Jake further back, the Wake Forest defense came to defend against Jake who was free.
Jake passed the ball to Williams, who was more open on the right, there was no one defending against Williams who had time to make the shot with ease and make 3 more points for the Tar Heels team.
With Jake organizing the attacks of the Tar Heels team they managed to increase the advantage on the scoreboard even though the players of the Tar Heels team did not perform well, in defense they had to try harder to guarantee the victory.
Jake continued to play well in the 2nd half and defended well against O'Kelley and so the Tar Heels team got the win by making 84 points against 48 points of the Wake Forest team, it was an easy victory in which the two teams don't play very well and Jake highlighted as always.
In this 2nd half of the game, Jake played for 20 minutes and had 17 points, 4 assists, 4 rebounds, 5 steals, and 2 blocks, with another double-double Jake can help the Tar Heels team to win and increase the sequence of games without lose.
"The game is over and the Tar Heels team easily wins again, 84 points against Wake Forest team's 48 points, so the Tar Heels team's winning streak increases again."
"That's right, in this game the players of the Tar Heels team were not very well and only Jake and Williams performed well, but unlike the last game the players of the Wake Forest team did not perform well either."
"So with Jake playing well in attack and defense, the Tar Heels team achieved an excellent victory like this, this is good to give more confidence to the Tar Heels team before the next difficult game that will be the last game before the start of the ACC tournament."
"The next opponent is the Duke Blue Devils team, which is the biggest rival of the Tar Heels team, it will be a game as a visitor without the support of the fans and the players of the Tar Heels team will have to have an excellent performance if they want to win."
"It is true, even if Jake has another excellent performance it will be difficult to achieve victory if the players of the Tar Heels team do not perform very well, perhaps in the next game we will see the end of the winning streak for the Tar Heels team."
Coach Guthridge and the Tar Heels team players had the same concern for the next game, but they could do nothing but train hard to get the win, everyone knew they could trust Jake and if everyone worked hard they knew they could win.
The Duke Blue Devils team really was the toughest opponent that Jake thought he had in both seasons, it was very difficult games and Jake always had to work hard to get the victory for the Tar Heels team.
After returning to university Jake celebrated with his roommates that they were very happy about it, they cheered for the Tar Heels team and were basketball fans, studying at North Carolina University and still being in the same dorm as Jake who was the best player on the Tar Heels team that would go down in history was exciting.
Certainly, this would be known as one of the best teams of all time just for this sequence of victories and for having won the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament last season and having Jake on the team.
They will be able to tell their children in the future about what had happened, Jake also talked to his mother who watched all the games that were on television, Eva had even put up television to watch the games in the restaurant.
After this tiring game against the Wake Forest team, Coach Guthridge gave players a day to rest and then it would be two days of intense training before the next game to see if the players would perform better in the next game.
Jake was not tired and would use that day to train more with Yuen Woo-ping, Jake continued to learn the movements he would have to use when he was on the cables to do the fights in the film.
Arriving in Australia where they would shoot the film Jake and Yuen Woo-ping would join everyone to make the scenes in the fight cables that would be edited for the incredible scenes in the film look as if the characters were flying while fighting.
As Yuen Woo-ping knew that Jake learned new moves very quickly he decided to teach Jake several things so he could speed up Jake's preparation in a few days, just as he hoped Jake really learned everything he taught quickly and Jake can repeat almost perfectly.
Jake knew that this was possible because of his intelligence statistics of 63 and also because of his agility, even the technique that gave him a photographic memory helped a lot in learning new things.
Jake was patient and just learned everything and repeated what Yuen Woo-ping did and didn't ask to try to use it as fighting moves, but after classes ended because Yuen Woo-ping was tired Jake asked Yuen Woo-ping if it was possible that he learn some techniques and movements of kung fu or any martial arts.
So Yuen Woo-ping taught Jake something he didn't know, the movements he was learning could be used for self-defense if they were used well because they had elements of martial arts.
But it was impossible for Jake to try to casually learn any type of martial arts because it took a long time to train his body to use fighting techniques, it was important to train his hands, arms, and legs to be able to start fighting without having the risk of getting hurt even without being hit.
So basically Jake would have to spend a few months training his body before he could start to learn some movements and fighting techniques, the martial arts that use safety equipment or are professional competitions that can be taught without long body training.
Yuen Woo-ping even gave examples like in kung fu that masters could defend themselves from strong kicks and blows using only their hands, kung fu masters had to train their hands for years to do this, otherwise, they would break hands when defending themselves of a kick, in addition to the techniques necessary to do this.
Judo was a martial art that could be used without body training just to learn a few moves, but to become a master you would have to train your body the same way, and time to do that was something Jake didn't have.
Jake thought that because his body was stronger than ordinary people because of his statistics and because of the system he was embarrassed to underestimate the martial arts, of course, if Jake trained like the others did he would get better results more easily.
After two days Jake started doing some training with Yuen Woo-ping, Yuen Woo-ping said that this way Jake could learn more easily how to do the movements he had learned and that he would have to do hanging on the cables afterward.
During the training sessions between the two Jake missed several moves he had learned and if it was a real fight he would be attacked several times by Yuen Woo-ping, but just as Yuen Woo-ping said, Jake felt he was learning better the moves he had seen in the past few days training with Yuen Woo-ping.
What Jake didn't know was that Yuen Woo-ping was really impressed after training with him, just doing a light Sparring that Yuen Woo-ping can see the strength and agility that Jake had.
Yuen Woo-ping saw that Jake was not only quick to make the moves but also had very fast reflexes and his reaction speed was very fast, so Jake was not hit by several strokes that he should have hit.
And Jake just deflected what was more difficult than defending using techniques, as Yuen Woo-ping had said Jake could already defend himself from someone who didn't know how to use martial arts only with what he learned in the last few days and using his reflex.
Of course, next month Jake still had a lot to learn and Yuen Woo-ping was excited to see what Jake's character in the movie The Matrix would look like, after all, Jake should be one of the ones who fought the most after the main character, and by the training, it would seem that Jake fought better than the main character.
After training with Yuen Woo-ping and also two days with the basketball team, the day of the last game of the season came before the ACC tournament started, this was the last game that the Tar Heels team could lose without being eliminated from a tournament.
After that, the Tar Heels team would have the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament and could not even lose any more games, that would be good because the other teams would have the same pressure as the Tar Heels team to not be able to lose any games.
The players of the Tar Heels team were no longer so confident even though they had trained a lot since the last game, in the last two games the players were rested and focused on the game and yet some players did not perform well.
Williams and Okulaja were not so concerned about that because Williams had played well in the last games and Okulaja was doing well in defense which was his biggest responsibility on the team, Jamison still had good performances in those last games.
Carter was the one who was most concerned about this even with Coach Guthridge and Jake saying that he still helped the team a lot by making more than 10 points per game, yet everyone besides Jake was concerned.
In this game they would have to worry about the defense also because the Duke Blue Devils team knows how to take advantage of the plays outside the three-point line, even though in the last game between them Jake and Williams had defended well, it was still a risk that they had to worry about.
With that game as a visitor still and against the Duke Blue Devils team that was second in the ACC conference with just one defeat it would be a difficult game to win and Jake was concerned about that.
"Welcome to another game here this season at the ACC conference, this is the second game between these great rivals, the Tar Heels team and the team Duke Blue Devils."
"In the first game the two were almost tied for first place at the ACC conference and the Tar Heels team had this winning streak, everyone expected a difficult game to happen and the Duke Blue Devils team could win and stay in first."
"But what happened was that Jake and Jamison had an excellent game and it was an easy win with a big advantage for the Tar Heels team at the Dean Smith Center, so this game here Cameron Indoor Stadium could be the rematch for the Duke Blue Devils team."
"Another important detail is that the Duke Blue Devils team has not beaten the Tar Heels team since 1993 when they won that year's NCAA title, 5 years ago from that game and there were 10 straight victories for the Tar Heels team."
"But the Tar Heels team also doesn't want to lose in this game, Jake and Jamison have been playing well all season and will try to guarantee the victory for the Tar Heels team in that game and further increase their winning streak."
Just as Coach Guthridge asked the team they started pressing on the attack, even though their defense was praised, Tar Heels' strength was the attack, Jake could score more than 30 points in almost every game and the team still had Jamison, Carter, and Williams who were also incredible attacking players.
So with Jake commanding the team at the beginning of the game they were willing to attack, in a play Jake passed the ball to Carter from the left after passing through the middle of the court, Carter was eager to make a good game that day and advanced with the ball.
Carter advanced to the three-point line and passed the ball to Jamison from the left, Jamison did not hold the ball back to Jake further back, Jake received the ball and then attempted a shot from outside of the three-point line and making 3 more points for the Tar Heels team.
The Duke Blue Devils team did not expect the Tar Heels team to start putting so much pressure on the attack playing as a visitor and knowing they needed to win, and even if they knew it was difficult to stop the Tar Heels attack this season.
So, in addition to reinforcing the defense, the Duke Blue Devils team knew they needed to attack if they wanted to have a chance to win in that game, the strength of this team was the three-point play and the fact that the whole team attacked together and everyone had the quality to attack and defend.
They had no main players that stood out much more than the others and even those in the reserve could decide an important game, it was because of that style of play that everyone was important that the Duke Blue Devils team always had a team strong.
So the Tar Heels team was also prepared to defend this game against this difficult opponent, Jake was not defending against anyone in this 1st half of the game and was just watching if someone would perform better and so he would defend against that person.
Jake only defended against the best players in the three-point line, but the truth was that when he didn't defend against anyone he sometimes played better because he could defend against more opponents even if he couldn't block by playing like that.
In another play the Duke Blue Devils team was attacking, after a good play in which the Tar Heels defense could not keep up with the left ball for Roshown McLeod, Jake was defending on the left side and so McLeod was free to try the outside shot to making 3 more points for the Duke Blue Devils team.
The Duke Blue Devils team still tried to react by making a good game in the attack, but with Jake and Jamison leading the attack of the Tar Heels team it was difficult for the Duke Blue Devils team to defend or lessen the advantage on the scoreboard.
In another move Jake advanced the ball even before the three-point line and passed to Williams on the right, Williams was also fine in that 1st half of the game, but he couldn't score much because Jake was attacking more with Jamison and Carter.
Williams passed the ball to Okulaja further down the right, Okulaja tried to advance the ball to try to enter the painted area, but the Duke Blue Devils team's defense was strong in the painted area.
So Okulaja had to stop and pass the ball farther back to Jake in the middle, when Jake took the ball the defense of the Duke Blue Devils team went to defend by the side of Jamison and Carter, Williams was open on the right and Okulaja was more in the middle.
Seeing this, Jake made a feint and tricked the opponent by advancing on the almost empty right, the defense players of the Duke Blue Devils team realized this and some players on the left went to the right trying to defend against Jake.
Jake moved forward with speed and when he found Trajan Langdon he did a quick crossover and managed to get rid of Langdon going through the middle, Jake made a mess in the defense of the Duke Blue Devils team who sent another player to defend against Jake.
Jake didn't try to go any further when he saw that more players from the Duke Blue Devils team came to defend against him and passed the ball to Carter further down the left, with the players who came to defend against Jake and the player who was defending against Jamison, Carter can receive the ball freely and make a dunk to cheer up teammates and make 2 more points for the Tar Heels team.
With Jake's leadership in the strong attack of the Tar Heels team they ended the 1st half by winning the game with a big advantage on the scoreboard, with that advantage unless the players of the Tar Heels team made a mistake they would easily win that game.
In this 1st half of the game Jake played for 20 minutes and had 16 points, 5 assists, 4 rebounds, and 6 steals, Jake was satisfied with the performance of his teammates in that game and everyone was trying as hard as they could to bring victory for the Tar Heels team.
"What a great performance from the Tar Heels team players in this game, everyone is playing well and Jamison returned to playing well with 12 points until that point in the game, Jake is having an easier time organizing the attacks in that game and he himself scored 16 points in the 1st half of the game."
"The players on the Duke Blue Devils team also performed well, but they made a lot of mistakes and Jake even hindered the Duke Blue Devils team by making 6 steals, so they scored fewer points than the Tar Heels team."
"It is true, but this result does not decide the game, I could see that some players on the Tar Heels team ended up tired this 1st half because of the intensity of the last games and because of the pressure as well."
"The Duke Blue Devils team still has a chance of winning the game even with the Tar Heels team having such a great advantage at the end of the 1st half, the players of the Duke Blue Devils team have the skill and because the reserves play well in the game the initial players they're not that tired."
"I don't think so, from what we are seeing in this game if Jake continues to play well and the defense of the Tar Heels team plays well the victory is guaranteed, Jake usually has more than 30 points in all games, so he should get another 14 points at least and there are his teammates."
The commentators were divided in that game as well as all the sports media were, this was because some wanted to see the Tar Heels team lose to the Duke Blue Devils team before the start of the ACC tournament and others wanted to see the Tar Heels team continue to win until they won again the NCAA tournament this season.
It would be a very good story for reporters to see the defeat of the Tar Heels team and the end of their winning streak without achieving the record that they so wanted to be the second team with the longest winning streak in history.
That's because both fans of the Tar Heels team and fans of other teams and basketball, in general, bought the magazines and newspapers with this news, after all, everyone in the media knew that a story of failure had more impact than a story of success.
And there were other members of the media who wanted to see the Tar Heels team win until the NCAA tournament, because then they would have an exciting story about one of the best teams in the history of college basketball who would have managed to win two ACC tournaments and two NCAA tournaments in a row and with a sequence of more than 60 games without losing.
Of course, Jake and the Tar Heels team players wanted to see the Tar Heels team win and so they intended to continue with that advantage on the scoreboard until they won this important game, and the Duke Blue Devils players would love to win that game and end that rival record.
At the beginning of the 2nd half, everyone could see that the Duke Blue Devils team returned to try to win by pressing in the attack, the players of the Tar Heels team recovered in the interval, but were still much more tired than the opponents.
What impressed everyone was how Jake defended on the three-point line by putting pressure on three different players from the Duke Blue Devils team and because of that the three always remained in different positions in the attack so that Jake could not defend against the three.
In another attacking move, the Duke Blue Devils team managed to make a good move and again the three players on the Duke Blue Devils three-point line separated so that Jake could not defend against all of them.
But the defense of the Tar Heels team was not only Jake and also had Williams and Carter defending on the three-point line against the three opposing players, but this also hindered the Duke Blue Devils attack move and made them lose time in possession ball.
So with a few seconds left the ball was passed to McLeod, Jake went to defend against him so as not to risk being caught by surprise, so McLeod passed the ball to Langdon who had Williams defending against him.
Langdon used the skill to get some space to try the shot and hit to make 3 more points for the Duke Blue Devils team, the players of the Tar Heels team were not affected by these three points of the opponent and continued the game smoothly.
This great advantage that they had on the scoreboard helped them to be able to play more calmly with less pressure even with everything that was happening to them and playing as a visitor, on the contrary, the Duke Blue Devils team had to make three-point plays because only then they had a chance to win the game.
And because of that more than half of their attacks ended up being wasted, the players of the Tar Heels team also started to miss more moves in the 2nd half and so the Duke Blue Devils team saw the opportunity to try to win.
The biggest problem was that Jake hardly missed attacks and the Tar Heels team also had very good players in catching offensive rebounds, so some of his mistakes could come back for another chance with a rebound.
In another move Jake moved forward and passed the ball to Williams from the right, Williams was performing well in that game too and was satisfied with his team's victory so far.
Williams slowly advanced to the three-point line and passed the ball to Okulaja further on the right, Okulaja held the ball and passed it back to Carter on the left, Carter passed the ball to Jake quickly through the middle.
The Duke Blue Devils players pressed the defense against Jake and Jamison too, Jake signaled and Carter returned to make a screen and hinder the Duke Blue Devils player who was on defense.
So Jake can go to the left and calmly try the shot from outside to hit and make 3 more points for the Tar Heels team, with Jake and Williams hitting the three-point shots it was more difficult for the Duke Blue Devils team to win.
Because of the defense of the Tar Heels team that was well in the game and with the good attack of the Tar Heels team, the Duke Blue Devils team was having difficulty to diminish the advantage that the Tar Heels team had in the game.
Even so with the good game in the 2nd half of the Duke Blue Devils players and several mistakes by the Tar Heels team players they managed to diminish the advantage, but with less than 10 minutes left in the game they realized they would not be able to win any more in that game.
The players of the Tar Heels team also realized this and were able to relax even more and managed to play even better without so much pressure, the only problem was the fatigue of the players and also because the Duke Blue Devils team did not give up the victory.
Even so, the Tar Heels team players continued to run really tired because they knew they would have more than 5 days to rest before the next game in the ACC tournament, so the game continued to be exciting even though the Tar Heels team had a good lead on the scoreboard.
In another play Jake advanced with the ball and passed the middle of the court and passed the ball to Carter from the left, Carter was playing well in that game even though he couldn't score as many points as Jake and Jamison.
Carter advanced until after the three-point line and passed the ball to Williams on the right, Williams was open on the right and the defense did not press because Williams did not try so many shots from outside when he played with Jake.
Williams passed the ball to Jamison on the left and the Duke Blue Devils team's defense immediately put pressure on him, Jamison tried the play and seeing that he couldn't move forward, he passed the ball to Jake who was coming back in the middle.
Jake was within the three-point line and had freedom because he had tricked a defender before receiving the ball, other players on the Duke Blue Devils team soon came to defend against Jake and he signaled to Carter.
Carter understood that Jake wanted to make the same move as the 1st half and came to make the screen, Carter hindered the player who was defending against Jake, so he can advance to the right and soon some players approached Jake to prevent him from making the mid-range shot.
What nobody expected was that Jake made a high pass for Carter to take the top and make a dunk and complete the alley-oop and make 2 more points for the Tar Heels team, after making the screen the defender who was defending against Carter went to defend against Jake so that Carter can enter the painted area alone and Jake did alley-oop with him.
This was a move that they trained a lot in the training of the basketball team, both knew that sometimes the opposing players would prefer to defend against Jake and so Carter would be free to do the dunk, in the 1st half it didn't happen and Jake took advantage of the space and hit the three-point shot.
With Jake playing so well and the Tar Heels team players were also performing well even though they were more tired, with the team so they managed to win this game more.
The Tar Heels team won the game by making 82 points against Duke Blue Devils' 72 points, with this victory the Tar Heels team had a sequence of 55 victories in a row, the players celebrated this a lot because they thought the greatest pressure they had decreased.
The Tar Heels team still had to win all the remaining games to win the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament, but all the teams had the same pressure on them and that would no longer be a problem for the players.
In that 2nd half, Jake played for 20 minutes and made 14 points, 5 assists, 5 rebounds, and 6 steals, with Jake's triple-double in that game he helped the Tar Heels team win this game that they would have lost if he didn't was playing like he did before Jake went back in time.
"And so another game of the season ends this year, the last game at the ACC conference before the start of the ACC tournament, the Tar Heels team achieved another good victory in this difficult game and thus managed to increase the sequence of victories for their team."
"This is very good because after this game all the opposing teams will also have the pressure of having to win because they will be eliminatory games and a defeat means the elimination of the ACC tournament."
"Players on the Tar Heels team will have more than 5 days to rest before the first game of the ACC tournament, so players can recover completely and if they play as well as today it is possible for them to win that game."
"It's true, the players of the Duke Blue Devils team played very well in that game and made it one of the most difficult games for the Tar Heels team to win this season, but with Jake's defense very strong and also Jake, Jamison, Williams, and Carter in the attack it was difficult for them to win this game."
"But we can see how the players on the Tar Heels team have a problem with their physical condition after several games in a row except for Jake, so if those teams face each other in the ACC tournament, another exciting game that the Duke Blue Devils team can achieve can happen. the victory."
Everyone could see that in this game even the players of the Tar Heels team performing well had it not been for Jake they would have lost this game, the physical condition of the players was a problem because everyone had to play many minutes in every game because the coach Guthridge was unable to place the reserves and risk the team losing the game.
In the reserve they had Makhtar N'Diaye who could be considered one of the main players of the team, the team also had Ed Cota who played very well and the young Brendan Haywood who had a good performance in training.
The problem was that N'Diaye and Haywood were players who had more defensive characteristics and that was contrary to the Tar Heels team's playing style this season, and Ed Cota who could be a starting player on any team couldn't get in because his highlight it was the assists that Jake did even better than he did.
If Ed Cota was still a player like Shammond Williams who scored a lot of points he could join Jake to help the team by making assists and points, but as he was not very skilled at scoring a lot of points he had no place on the team this season.
What Coach Guthridge thought was the same as Jake thought that these players would be very important in the next seasons with Team Tar Heels when Jake, Jamison, Williams, and Carter left.
Brendan Haywood would be one of the best players on the Tar Heels team for the next seasons and Ed Cota would also lead the team for his next two years at the university, the problem was that on this team they had no place to play.
Coach Guthridge was concerned that the Tar Heels team would have three games in a row if they reached the final of the ACC tournament and they thought the players would not be able to take those games in a row.
When Jake was considering joining the Tar Heels team to leave Cameron Indoor Stadium for them to return to the university, a reporter stopped Jake and asked to do a quick interview with him.
Jake usually didn't accept doing interviews, but after a good game and before the ACC tournament he was in a very good mood and agreed to do the interview with this reporter when Jake accepted he realized that the reporter didn't seem to expect him to accept, but soon prepared the questions.
"Mr. Smith, the Tar Heels team has been having one of the best seasons in the team's history and after that game, there are 55 games without losing, what do you feel about being part of a team that will surely be known in history?"
"I am very happy with this, it is an important moment in my career and I am happy to be in this team with my teammates, we always make our greatest effort in the games and that is why we are achieving this sequence of incredible games."
"Many members of the media and even basketball fans say that you are the best player on the current Tar Heels team and one of the best college basketball players in history, what do you think about that?"
"I'm happy when I get compliments from the sports media and Tar Heels team fans and basketball in general, but I don't think I can say I'm the best player on my team, we have a good team and I have good teammates that if they can't play a game for some reason the game would be much more difficult."
"I myself could not participate in a game and my team still managed to win showing that they do not depend on me to win, I believe that I am the best of my team and maybe in the whole College basketball playing as PG, but my teammates stand out in other positions as well."
The reporter was intelligent and asked questions that everyone wanted to know and that he knew Jake would not refuse to answer and also always asked the question indirectly so that Jake could easily give an answer that would not offend anyone as he was doing.
"And what do you think the Tar Heels team can achieve this season? Do you expect to win the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament again?"
"For sure, I believe that our team has the quality to win the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament and we will do our best to win, our goal is to win and I believe we are able to achieve that."
Jake did a quick interview and the reporter thanked him several times for his attention, Jake had said some things that could irritate some players and some teams, but he really had confidence that they would win and if the Tar Heels team really won he wouldn't be called an arrogant.
The Tar Heels team players went back to the university and nobody had seen Jake doing that interview, Coach Guthridge knew that the team was prepared for the ACC tournament and so he gave everyone a two-day rest.
Afterward, they still had three more days to prepare before the first game of the ACC tournament, Jake would naturally not come home on those rest days and would only train with Yuen Woo-ping and also train with the basketball team after the rest.
Jake still had a lot to learn before the movie started, even if he learned all the martial arts moves that he would have to use in the movie he would take a long time to train using that move so he wouldn't make mistakes when using the cables.
So Yuen Woo-ping taught Jake the movements for a few hours and then trained with Jake for a few hours so that he could better learn what Yuen Woo-ping had taught him.
The most important thing was that it was difficult for Jake to do a Sparring with Yuen Woo-ping because the most important thing was not just to make the movements correctly and use the strength he had, Jake had to learn how to fight with Yuen Woo-ping using movements really hurt Yuen Woo-ping.
After all, he was an actor and the moves were more to pretend to the audience that they were having an exciting fight, but Jake couldn't really hit a blow because he could hurt the other actors.
At most, they could use some moves that could be easily defended and would not hurt much and these blows Jake could hit to bring more realism to the film, seeing this Jake discovered the truth about some of the films he liked most and saw that maybe learning arts martial arts were not as cool as he thought before.
What Jake didn't know was that Yuen Woo-ping was really impressed by his talent, Yuen Woo-ping was thinking that in other films that he participated in as a director he could invite Jake to participate in the film because Jake was able to make a film as if he were a martial arts master.
There were some films that they had a hard time using foreign actors because foreign actors who knew how to fight couldn't fight the same martial arts that Yuen Woo-ping used in his films, so someone tall and talented like Jake was an excellent candidate to do one antagonist and a villain someday.
Of course, he knew that it was impossible for Jake to go to China or other places to participate in the filming of a film without the director of the film making a good plan beforehand, but to have Jake in the film he could organize part of the recording for being in the United States and in a few months that Jake had time.
After all, there were many fight films in which the film's villain did not appear until the end of the film and only fought the main character, of course, they would have to wait a few years for this to happen and Jake would have to train more because it would be difficult find a double that looks like him.
So Jake continued training with Yuen Woo-ping and it looked like he could easily join the film crew in Australia and not have to worry about the fight scenes he would have to do.
After two days of rest, the Tar Heels team players went back to training, that day also came out the article that showed the interview that Jake had done, Jake read and was pleased to see that the reporter had written everything exactly as he said and did not distort his words.
Even though Jake tried to make only statements about things that were reality trying to show his humility, many basketball players and teams did not like the part of the story that Jake had talked about them.
He naturally hoped that there were people who would not like what he had to say, the most important thing was that Tar Heels fans who were concerned about the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament were able to relax more after watching this interview.
The players had also been happy to see in the story that Jake really trusted the team, they had less pressure with the ACC tournament starting and those two days of rest can prepare players for the next games.
The players did not do any intense training in the next few days because they would have three games in three days in a row without a day off and everyone knew that it would be difficult to maintain their best physical condition.
So in the next few days, Jake continued training with the Tar Heels team and also with Yuen Woo-ping, in a few more weeks they would finish training for the cable fights and also train for the fights they would normally have.
After all, it was not in all the fight scenes in the film that Jake and the other actors would be put on a cable to make movements impossible to make without this equipment, they would also have scenes of struggles as in any action film and Jake would have to learn to do these scenes correctly.
After almost a week of training came the day of the Tar Heels team's first game at the ACC tournament, just as last season would be three games on three consecutive days and the games would be at the Greensboro Coliseum.
The opponent of that game would be the NC State Wolfpack team that was a tough opponent in the last game between them, in addition, it was the NC State Wolfpack team that was the opponent in the final of the ACC tournament last season.
Even though the Tar Heels team players were confident in this game because they were in great physical condition, they still respected their opponents and knew that this was going to be a game and that they had to concentrate.
The Tar Heels team had to win this game if they wanted to win the ACC tournament and continue with the winning streak, Jake was very focused and knew that in this game he had to have a great performance if he wanted to guarantee the victory of the Tar Heels team.
"Welcome to everyone who is here to follow this incredible game this season at College basketball, today's game is the first game of the most disputed tournament of all the ACC conferences."
"The Tar Heels team that won last season has been doing an impressive season and is breaking records with this current team that has incredible players like Jake Smith and Antawn Jamison who are vying to see who is the best player this season."
"The opposing team in this game is the NC State Wolfpack team, it is the third game between these two teams that played in the final of the ACC tournament last season that the Tar Heels team won, in the last game the NC State Wolfpack team also impressed by making the Tar Heels team suffer to win."
"We will follow this game to find out which team will win and continue in the ACC tournament."
The Tar Heels team soon started strong in the game by pressing in the attack, Coach Guthridge did not underestimate the opponent and asked the Tar Heels team to press in the attack from the beginning and that Jake organized the plays to try to keep the players from getting too tired.
Coach Guthridge's idea was that if the Tar Heels team played a good game in the 1st half, they would place the reserves to play for longer and thus let the starting players rest for the next game that would be the next day.
Naturally, if the game was difficult he would leave the team complete, after all, they had to win this game against the NC State Wolfpack team in order to play the next game in the ACC tournament the next day.
In the first few minutes of the game, Jake realized that Carter was not performing well in that game and could not score, so Jake decided that he would talk to Coach Guthridge about it at the end of the 1st half.
In the 1st half, Carter could still help the team by attracting the attention of the defensive players of the NC State Wolfpack team, in another play Jake advanced the ball and passed to Carter on the left before the three-point line.
Carter did not know that Jake had decided not to make assists for him and thought to help the team, Carter tried the feint and could not get rid of the opposing player, so Carter passed the ball to Jamison who was further ahead on the left.
Jamison also tried to get rid of the defense and advance to the painted area, but as he couldn't pass the ball to Jake who was further back in the middle, Jake received the ball and soon stepped back and tried an outside shot to make three more points for the Tar Heels team.
Jake had decided that he would try his best performance in all games to guarantee the victory of the Tar Heels team until they won the NCAA tournament, so he did not hesitate to try the three-point shot when he was free.
In this game the players of the NC State Wolfpack team were not playing very well as they did in the last game against the Tar Heels team, Jake was defending against Clint Harrison just in case and was also defending against other players in the three-point line.
In another move the NC State Wolfpack team was trying another attack and after a good move the ball went to Harrison, Jake was away from him to defend against other players and he tried the shot from outside and Jake moved quickly and still managed the block.
What the basketball experts always said was that Jake's strong point was that he was very talented, it wasn't his three-point shot, but his speed, that speed helped him defend well and attack quickly without adversaries could not prevent.
In that move Jake was far from where Harrison was when he attempted the shot from outside, but when Harrison started the three-point shot Jake approached quickly and still managed to block and end the NC State Wolfpack team's attack.