Lakers News: Kobe Bryant Finals Opponent Concedes LA Great Was "Unstoppable"
Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant firmly established his own place in the team's history books, separate from former LA superstar center Shaquille O'Neal, during a five-game NBA Finals series victory over three-time Defensive Player of the Year Dwight Howard and the rest of his Orlando Magic.
Fresh off a six-game 2008 NBA Finals loss to a loaded Boston Celtics club, LA returned to the promised land the very next year, propelled by the performances of Bryant and a jumbo-sized frontcourt top three rotation comprising future Hall of Famer Pau Gasol, future All-Star Andrew Bynum, and future Sixth Man of the Year Lamar Odom. This time, against a younger but less-talented Magic team, they got the job done.
During an And1 Basketball event in New York this past July, Brandon "Scoop B" Robinson of Bally Sports caught up with 11-year NBA journeyman guard Rafer Alston, then a crucial part of the Magic's backcourt rotation, to discuss a variety of topics (the full interview is here).
Chief among those topics was the impossibility of defending Bryant during the end of the 18-time All-Star's prime, in that fateful 2009 Finals series.
"He was unstoppable," Alston conceded. "Every day we would game-plan how to stop him, he would still get 25, 30, 30-something points. He was one guy, like Michael Jordan, they'd not only defeat the players, they'd defeat the coaching schemes. That was something I witnessed firsthand, and then my guy that's from my neighborhood, Lamar Odom, even though want to beat him, I was happy to see that he was on that team that won a title, too."
In that series, en route to winning his first Finals MVP honor, Bryant averaged 32.4 points on .430/.360/.841 shooting splits, 7.4 assists, 5.6 rebounds, 1.4 blocks, and 1.4 steals across 43.8 minutes a night.
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