The next day.
Hibari arrived at the basketball club on time.
After warming up, Hibari and the others began different specialized training sessions under the coach’s guidance.
The basketball club’s activity time was limited, so they didn’t have much time for specialized training.
Wanted to improve?
Then go home and put in extra work yourself.
Because after specialized training ended, the team still had the most important part: full-team practice.
Each player’s specialized training content was different.
After all, each player needed to improve in different areas.
For example, Hayato Takahashi could tell that Hibari’s fundamentals weren’t solid enough.
So Hibari’s specialized training was to grit his teeth and grind the basics.
Aside from that, he also had Hibari practice shooting.
With Eikichi Nebuya holding down the paint, Chiba Middle School had some guarantee of interior scoring.
But Eikichi Nebuya, whose head was full of muscle, lacked playmaking ability.
Once the ball reached his hands, it usually meant the team’s offense was about to end.
In that one-on-one game, Hibari had shown a certain degree of shooting ability, so the coach wanted him to further develop his shot and improve the team’s perimeter firepower.
Hibari didn’t reject this arrangement.
After specialized training was completed, next came practical three-on-three cross-match scrimmages.
Hayato Takahashi was a coach who worshiped muscular defense and was deeply obsessed with highly physical basketball.
That said, basketball in this era itself placed great emphasis on physical confrontation.
Without exaggeration, if you brought future MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander into this era’s NBA, he might not even last a full season before breaking down.
You wanted free throws for leaning forward on a jumper?
Impossible.
Two slaps for you was more like it.
“Even in training, you must treat your teammates as real opponents!” “If you go easy on your teammate now, you’re basically sending him onto the court in the future to be slaughtered by the opponent!” Hibari watched in amazement, thinking that Eikichi Nebuya’s obsession with contact and muscles probably owed no small amount to this coach’s guidance.
The three-on-three groups were random.
Today, Hibari was placed on a team with Eikichi Nebuya.
Joining them was a backup guard.
He was also a first-year student.
“Kid, later, all you need to do is give me the ball.
My muscles will solve every problem.” Eikichi Nebuya showed off the bend of his arm, his muscles bulging in powerful blocks.
He looked extremely fierce.
“Yes, captain!” The first-year had just nodded when Hibari, standing nearby, also spoke up.
“Don’t.
The other side will definitely lock onto this big guy.
Give me the ball and let me handle it.
That’s the smarter way to play.” Captain or not, this basketball club would sooner or later belong to him, Hibari.
Although he still hadn’t accomplished anything, the aura of a ball hog had already begun to reveal itself.
“Uh, this…” The first-year was immediately at a loss.
He felt Hibari had a point, but Eikichi Nebuya was the basketball club captain.
“Huh?
Hibari, do you have a problem with my muscles?” “I have no problem with your muscles.” “Then why are you fighting me for touches?
Are you saying my muscles can’t take on three people at once?” “If there’s a better way, why insist on solving everything with muscles?
Can your stamina carry three people for a full forty-minute game?” “Why couldn’t it?!
My muscles can keep training!” Hibari had no words left for this muscle alien.
Muscles this, muscles that.
Could your muscles tank a nuke or something?
…
The scrimmage began.
Hibari’s three-man team had possession.
The guard received the inbound pass and immediately saw the other two big shots reach out to him at the same time.
“First-year, give me the ball.” “Pass it here.” The guard was cursing in his heart.
Playing with these ball hogs was honestly exhausting.
After thinking for a moment, he still lobbed the ball inside to team captain Eikichi Nebuya.
Sure enough.
The moment the latter caught the ball, all three opponents immediately swarmed him.
It was as if Eikichi Nebuya’s pass button had been pried off.
There were no teammates in his eyes anymore.
Huge slabs of muscle bulged as he battled three people head-on beneath the basket.
Who knew how he generated that strength, but he really did withstand the three-man siege.
However, just as he went up for the dunk, he ate a massive block from the other side.
“Smack!” The ball was swatted outside the three-point line.
The team’s guard picked up the loose ball and planned to take a shot himself.
Who knew when Hibari had slipped back out, reaching for the ball again.
“Give it to me.
Play smart!” What was that supposed to mean?
Was not giving you the ball the same as not playing smart?
The guard cursed him as an idiot in his heart, but still passed the ball over.
Hibari had previously fought Eikichi Nebuya to a near draw in a one-on-one, leaving a deep impression on the basketball club members.
Ordinary players really didn’t dare provoke him.
Hibari caught and shot, but who would have thought the opponent had long been prepared?
“Don’t even think about it, first-year!” A player roughly the same height as Hibari suddenly flew over from a distance.
Hibari noticed him.
The opponent’s large hand cut off the shooting lane.
If Hibari forced the shot, nine times out of ten it would be blocked.
But that was fine.
He still had his ultimate move.
With morale surging like a rainbow, Hibari roared in his heart, “King Crimson!” Buzz!
In an instant, the team’s starting power forward felt his vision blur.
A deep crimson flash flickered past, as though something before his eyes had been erased.
No, it wasn’t that something had been erased.
It was that Hibari had suddenly vanished completely from in front of him.
“A fake?
How?!” His expression changed sharply, and he immediately turned back.
Sure enough, Hibari had already appeared behind him.
The expressions of the other basketball club members were fascinating.
They had seen the whole process.
Hibari seemed to have made an extremely realistic shooting motion, sending the defender flying, then broke forward.
It was just that the entire process happened far too quickly.
It looked as if Hibari had jumped through time.
“Perfect!” Hayato Takahashi’s heart surged.
Hibari’s crossover was so perfect that even he couldn’t understand how it had been done.
In that brief fraction of a second, Hibari had completed both the fake and the drive.
This was talent.
That calmness, that explosiveness, that composure.
“He was born to play basketball!” “Duang!” Just as the praise ended, Hibari’s mid-range jumper clanked off the rim.
The coach’s expression stiffened.
He felt like that particular damn moment had been just about to arrive, only for someone to suddenly step on the brakes, robbing him of a satisfying release.
Fortunately, Hibari had Eikichi Nebuya as a teammate.
“I told you to give me the ball!” “Muscle putback!” With a roar, he overpowered two players, grabbed the rebound, and slammed the ball into the hoop in one motion.
“Bang!” The rim shook violently, making it clear just how much force Eikichi Nebuya had put into that dunk.
“Roar!” Two points secured, Eikichi Nebuya landed and let out a beast-like roar, like a gorilla.
Turning around, he said to Hibari, “Your shot is even softer than that guy Iron Heart’s, but your drive is cool!” …
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