CHAPTER THIRTEEN 2002-2005
CHAPTER THIRTEEN Anticipation for yet another stellar season was high in the wake of the Lakers’ three-peat. But unfortunately, some of the team’s top players, including Shaq, were sidelined early with injuries and penalties. Indeed, if not for Kobe Bryant, the Lakers might have faded into the background in the fall of 2002.
But Bryant wasn’t about to let that happen. Now entering his seventh season with the NBA, he was one of the most dominating players on the court, and this year his deadly accuracy from the floor became even more threatening. In one game, he nailed 12 three-point shots, a new NBA high mark. He also posted a record-tying eight three-pointers in a single half; had a nine-game streak of 40 or more points, tying Michael Jordan’s record; and a 13-game streak of 35 or more points, making him only the fourth person to achieve that benchmark. But the highlight of his season came on March 5, 2003.
That night, the Lakers were playing the Pacers in Indiana. In the third quarter, Bryant got the ball and sailed into the air for a hanging jump shot. The ball slipped into the net for two points. On the surface, it wasn’t a remarkable play—nothing more than what he had done hundreds of times before.
But in fact, when that ball dropped through the hoop, Kobe Bryant made history. Those two points brought his career total to 10,000, making him the youngest player in NBA history to reach that milestone.
Moments later, the crowd learned what he had done. They erupted with cheers and gave him a standing ovation.
“I really can’t grasp what it means right now,” Bryant said later. “I had no idea the crowd was going to stand up the way they did. It was a little embarrassing, but it was a good feeling.”
Bryant continued to feel good and, along with Shaq and the other Lakers, to play great for the rest of the season. Los Angeles ended with a 50-32 record, good enough to put them in the playoffs for the fourth year in a row. They dispatched their competition there and reached the semifinals, where they faced the San Antonio Spurs. After four games, the series was tied at two apiece.
Game five was a hard-fought battle that found the Lakers down by three in the final seconds. Unbelievably, they nearly sent the game into overtime when Robert Horry tossed up a three pointer with 4.3 seconds left on the clock. The ball bounced in, and then inexplicably bounced out of the hoop. The Spurs took that game, and the next as well—and for the first time in the new millennium, the Lakers were out of the Championships.
The following year, Bryant posted numbers that were slightly lower than the previous years. Still, his stats were outstanding; with a per-game average of 24 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 5.1 assists, he was among the top players in the league. Following his sixth straight appearance at the All-Star Game, he added his ninth career triple-double, with 25 points, 14 rebounds, and 10 assists, in a game against the Washington Wizards.
Los Angeles roared into the playoffs again in 2004 by winning 14 of their last 17 games. They then charged past the Houston Rockets, the San Antonio Spurs, and the Minnesota Timberwolves to face the Detroit Pistons in the finals. Once there, however, they seemed to run out of steam. The Pistons outplayed and outshot the Lakers four out of the five contests. In game three, they embarrassed the LA team by beating them by a 20 point margin!
In years past, such a loss would have been unthinkable. But that loss wasn’t the only one the Lakers would suffer. In the following season, they took to the courts with a big hole in their roster. After eight amazing seasons, Shaquille O’Neal had been traded to the Miami Heat. Rumors swirled that the change had come at his request, made after Phil Jackson announced his decision not to return as the Lakers’ coach in the fall of 2004. Others claimed Shaq was tired of competing with Kobe. Still others said Kobe pushed Shaq out, a rumor that gained momentum when his new seven-year, $136.4 million contract was announced.
In the end, however, the reasons didn’t matter so much as the result—Shaq was gone. Competitors even when they were teammates, Kobe and Shaq would now be in true competition whenever they met on the court.
Fans looked forward to that first meeting, slated for Christmas Day, with great eagerness. The media hyped the event for weeks; when the Heat and theLakers took to the court, it was before a record-setting audience.
By all accounts, the Kobe-Shaq duel lived up to its hype. Shaq and the Heat won the game in overtime, with Shaq posting a double-double with 24 points and 11 rebounds. But Shaq also fouled out, his last two penalties given when he tried to block Kobe’s drives to the hoop. Kobe, meanwhile, drained in a game-high 42 points and nearly won the game for the Lakers with a close-but-no-cigar three pointer at the overtime buzzer.
“I had a pretty good look,” Bryant said of that last shot, “but I didn’t get the balance I would have liked.”
In the weeks following that ballyhooed match, Kobe and the Lakers often found themselves off-balance. On January 13, Bryant suffered a severe sprain to his right ankle, an injury that sidelined him for a month. Then, midway through his recovery, head coach Rudy Tomjanovich announced that he was stepping down for health reasons. Assistant coach Frank Hamblen worked his team as best he could, but in the end, his leadership couldn’t overcome the problems the Lakers were having. The season ended with LA missing a berth in the playoffs for the first time since 1994.
Kobe Bryant was disappointed with the results but had one high point to look back on. In the season’s final game, he chalked up his 14,000th point, surpassing Michael Jordan as the youngest player to reach that benchmark. Still, he would have traded that milestone for a chance to win another Championship ring.