With the NBA season on indefinite hold, we'll take the month of April to celebrate the life and career of Kobe Bryant, who passed away earlier this year. Kobe Month continues with a look at nine significant games that define his career, for better or worse.
1) May 12, 1997: Conference Semifinals, game five vs. Jazz
There were plenty of ups and downs in Bryant's rookie season, as the then 18-year-old adjusted to life at the pro level. Some nights he would play major minutes off the bench and some nights he wouldn't even leave his seat. At the end of the season he received a trial by fire, forced into a role as the offensive focal point in crunch time of a playoff game against Utah, as Byron Scott was out with a wrist injury, Shaquille O'Neal fouled out, and Robert Horry was ejected. With the Lakers trailing the series 3-1, Bryant played 28 minutes off the bench in game five, scoring 11 points on just 4-of-14 shooting, including 0-of-6 from three point range. Four of his final shots were not just misses but air balls: a short jumper that could have clinched the game late in regulation, a jumper early in overtime with the score tied, and three-pointers that could have tied the game with 43 seconds left, and again with three seconds left. When the Jazz won the game and finished the Lakers' season, Bryant supposedly returned home and immediately hit the gym to refine his jump shot. It was a humbling experience and perfect origin story for the legend of Bryant as NBA superstar.
2) June 14, 2000: NBA Finals, game four vs. Pacers
Though Bryant was years away from being an MVP or a scoring champion, this is the game that first defined his dominant persona. He had missed virtually all of games two and three of the Finals after spraining his ankle and though the Lakers held a 2-1 series lead, it was seemingly precarious with Bryant hobbling and the veteran Pacers proving a tough out. Then, we had this masterpiece: Kobe played over 46 minutes on what he would later call a "throbbing" ankle, scoring 28 points on 14-of-27 shooting and adding five assists. His best moments in the contest came in overtime after Shaquille O'Neal fouled out. In a preview of the Lakers' future with Bryant as the main scoring option, he took over down the stretch, hitting several key jumpers and one huge block on Austin Croshere, as Los Angeles held on for a 120-118 win to take a commanding 3-1 series lead.
3) May 12, 2002: Conference Semifinals, game four vs. Spurs
Winning three championships before he turned 24 allowed Bryant ample opportunities to prove his mettle in big postseason situations. One could argue that his performance in game three of this series against the Spurs was more impressive, and it certainly was if you're looking at just statistics. Game four, however, was where Bryant made one of the most unlikely and incredible game winners of his career. Hounded, as usual, by San Antonio's Bruce Bowen, Bryant managed 28 points in this game but on just 10-of-27 shooting from the floor. But he was the conduit for Los Angeles' fourth quarter comeback, both offensively and defensively, culminating in the Lakers' final possession, which was a perfect microcosm of Bryant's early career. With just under 30 seconds remaining and the game tied, he nearly turned it over by dribbling off his own foot, then desperately called for the ball when Derek Fisher recovered off the bounce. When Fisher missed a desperation runner, Bryant skied improbably high into the air for the rebound, then put in a teardrop put-back over the outstretched hands of David Robinson to win the game. It sealed a 10-point comeback in the final 10 minutes for the Lakers and finished off a fourth quarter where Bryant himself outscored the entire Spurs team, 12-10.
4) January 22, 2006: Regular season game vs. Raptors
It always seemed a matter of when, not if, Bryant would make a run at Wilt Chamberlain's 100 point single game record. His mix of irrational confidence and shoot-first mentality combined with his status as the only true scoring option on the '05-'06 Lakers to make it happen. It was a season in which Bryant led the NBA in scoring with 35.4 points per game while no one else on the Lakers averaged 15+. For a while the joke was that Kobe would need to shoot 100 times to reach 100 points but he was downright efficient on this night against Toronto, racking up 81 points on 28-of-46 shooting (60.9%) including 7-of-13 from three-point range, and 18-of-20 from the free throw line (you can watch every single made basket compressed into this three-minute video). And yes, it was a Lakers win, overcoming a 17-point third quarter deficit thanks to Bryant's scoring onslaught. Earlier in this season, Bryant had dropped 62 against the Mavericks, and he would pour in 60+ four more times in his career, doing so more times than any other player besides Wilt Chamberlain.
5) April 30, 2006: Conference Quarterfinals, game four vs. Suns
Just a few months after he scored 81 versus the Raptors, Bryant had his signature post-Shaq postseason moment in a first round series against the Suns. His Lakers were back in the playoffs after a one-year absence, just sneaking in as a #7 seed and forced to play the title favorites in Phoenix in the first round. Los Angeles took a stunning 2-1 series lead and set the stage for a thrilling game four. The Suns seemed to have things under control with a five-point lead with 12 seconds left but Smush Parker hit a three-pointer, Steve Nash committed a rare unforced turnover, and Bryant collected the ball and turned it into one of the signature shots of his career, a pretty, driving floater to force overtime. He then somehow topped it in the extra period, once again gathering a Nash lost ball and this time hitting a fade-away jumper over two defenders for the win. It was the fifth buzzer beater of his career and he would eventually rack up eight of them, a mark that only Michael Jordan, with nine, has bested.
6) February 15, 2009: 2009 All-Star Game
There were many flash points in the Kobe-Shaq feud post the latter's 2004 departure for Miami, starting with their notable Christmas Day match-up in the '04-'05 season. Things seemed to finally wind down at the 2009 All-Star Game in Phoenix, when the pair teamed up on the court for the first time in almost five years. O'Neal had been recently traded from the Heat to the Suns, placing him back in the Western Conference, and he was named as a reserve for the 2009 game, with Bryant as the team's leading vote getter. Not only were the duo reunited with each other, they were also both being coached by Phil Jackson for the first time since the 2004 NBA Finals loss to Detroit. After a typically grandiose pre-game entrance from O'Neal for the hometown fans, he entered the game late in the first quarter, and the West immediately embarked on a 19-0 run to take over the contest. Bryant led all scorers with 27 points in the 146-119 West win, while O'Neal added 17 points and five rebounds. They were named co-MVP, the third such honor for each player, and when Bryant handed his trophy to Shaq's son, Shareef, on the postgame dais, it was supposedly the moment O'Neal realized that their feud was officially over.
7) June 4, 2009: NBA Finals, game one vs. Magic
The Lakers entered the 2009 NBA Finals as heavy favorites to win their first championship featuring Bryant without Shaquille O'Neal. But Kobe wanted to assuage any doubts right at the beginning and he set the tone in game against the Magic. Though it certainly wasn't his most efficient shooting performance (16-of-34 from the field), Bryant was otherwise masterful in every aspect, finishing with 40 points, eight rebounds, and eight assists, while making defensive stops all over the court in a 100-75 win. He likely could have run up his stats even more, but Bryant sat out over half the fourth quarter as the Lakers had already amassed an insurmountable lead. In a five game series victory, he finished with 32.4 points and 7.4 assists per game, and was named Finals MVP for the first time in his career.
8) June 17, 2010: NBA Finals, game seven vs. Celtics
It was a quintessential late career Bryant game in a quintessential late career Bryant series: a slow slog, with some clutch shots mixed in with lots of misses, occasional heroic defensive stands, and just enough to pull it out. The record will forever show that Kobe was Finals MVP in 2010 as the Lakers defeated the Celtics in seven games but the tale of the tape tells a different story. He shot just 6-of-24 in the deciding game, closing out a series where he made just 40.5% of his field goals. He was also as dogged and determined as ever to win at all costs and there's no doubt that attitude and drive pushed teammates Pau Gasol and Metta World Peace to carry him over the finish line. This game in particular was a war of attrition as Bryant finished with not just 23 points but also 15 rebounds and kept making little plays down the stretch and getting to the free throw line even as his shots weren't going in. It's arguable that Gasol deserved the MVP award for this series which makes even more typical Bryant, for whom controversy with teammates always seemed to follow.
9) April 13, 2016: Final regular season game vs. Jazz
No one was sure what to expect for Bryant's last game. There were concerns whether his knees would hold up to let him play at all, and jokes that the seemingly meaningless match-up (the Lakers were dead last in the West) would allow his teammates to pass the ball to him on every play and rack up points. And then... well, that did sort of happen. He took an NBA record 50 field goal attempts and made 22 of them to finish with 60 points, leading the Lakers to a come-from-behind win. At age 37, he became the oldest player in history to score 60+ in a game and it was the perfect final Bryant performance: a little bit cheap, a little bit surreal, but wildly entertaining and befitting the end of a legend. An added bonus was that Bryant upstaged the Warriors, who on the same night at about the same time were winning their record 73rd game.