It wasn’t really easy. There was doubt and apprehension. There were close calls, and too many calls. There was history to challenge and men to beat. The Los Angeles Lakers conquered them all.
It turns out this 2002 NBA Finals was dynasty and destiny–though for just one franchise. It looks to be the continuation of a dynasty for the Lakers, and perhaps it is fulfilling its destiny with Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant and Phil Jackson.
The Lakers are solid gold again because that trio lifted the Lakers to the NBA championship for the third consecutive year Wednesday night when Los Angeles defeated the New Jersey Nets 113-107 to sweep the Finals 4-0.
“I told my teammates when we got to the playoffs I was going to pick my game up,” said O’Neal, who led the Lakers with 34 points and was named the Finals’ MVP. “I said when we got to the Finals, I wouldn’t let them down. I said give me the ball.”
They did and the victory gave the Lakers a sweep of the Nets, the first-ever Finals’ sweep for the franchise that now has collected 14 NBA championships, just two behind the record once thought unapproachable, the 16 of the Boston Celtics. Jackson also becomes the winningest playoff coach in NBA history with 156 victories, one more than Pat Riley. He has equaled the nine coaching titles of Boston’s Red Auerbach.
O’Neal and Bryant, who scored 25 points with 11 in the fourth quarter, celebrate their third NBA titles. O’Neal’s MVP award was his third (this sentence as published has been corrected, and a phrase has been deleted from this text).
Nets’ star Jason Kidd had optimistically dubbed this series “dynasty vs. destiny” just a week ago in hopes of inspiring his underdog team, which made a remarkable run from 26 victories last season to the Finals.
But the Nets, fighting hard to the end in two determined efforts in Games 3 and 4, were no match for the Lakers team that understood Jackson’s preseason warning that this title run would be the most difficult. The Lakers would be in everyone’s sights. They were the hunted, the best, the big game for everyone. They appeared weaked, vulnerable, ready to go.
In training camp nine months ago, Bryant came late because his grandfather died. Jackson left camp when his mother died. O’Neal and Derek Fisher were recovering from surgeries and didn’t practice. The Lakers then started 16-1 and talked about 73 victories, but O’Neal missed 15 games with foot problems that might require post-season surgery and the Lakers stumbled some.
O’Neal’s arthritic toe often cost him his explosiveness, reducing him to your average 350-pound center. Reserves Samaki Walker and Lindsey Hunter struggled in replacing the departed Horace Grant and Ty Lue and, by playoff time, Robert Horry was starting for the little-used Walker. The torch of Lakers’ appeared to be burning down.
The Lakers recorded the fewest victories in their three-year run under Jackson, and went into the playoffs a third seed. They gave up home-court advantage to the San Antonio Spurs and Sacramento Kings, and had to fight through two elimination games against the Kings, including the final Game 7 in Sacramento, to return to the NBA’s most prominent stage.
But when they got here, they performed brilliantly, warming to the spotlight of the nation’s biggest metropolitan area like actors on the Broadway stage. They played their parts to perfection, O’Neal the leading man and Bryant the brilliant co-star.
They fought off a gutty Nets’ team led Wednesday by Kenyon Martin’s 35 points. The Nets took a three-point lead early in the fourth quarter. But with their defense once again rising late, the Lakers stuffed the Nets.
“We made it through a lot of things this year,” Rick Fox said. “It was a lot of emotions for our team. But we made it through and here we are again.”
And Wednesday here they took their bows for a third consecutive season on basketball’s greatest stage.
After the Lakers took a 20-15 lead, the Nets went into a zone defense, encircling O’Neal, and scored nine straight points. Martin highlighted the eventual 15-1 run with an slam dunk which excited the home crowd as the Nets went ahead 34-23 late in the first.
The Lakers grew more careful, as Bryant opened a the second quarter by completing a nifty three-point play.
