by Shea Serrano
9. This was the first year Phil Jackson was the coach of the Lakers. It felt a lot like he’d finally gotten Kobe and Shaq to figure out their partnership during the season, and then it felt a lot like maybe it was all a ruse as the Blazers pulled away from them on their homecourt in a series where the Lakers had built up what was supposed to be an insurmountable 3–1 lead.
10. The Blazers had a stretch during the fourth quarter where they missed 13 straight shots. They finished the quarter 5 for 23 from the field and were out-scored 31–13 overall. It was as much a collapse on their part as it was a comeback by the Lakers. It was all just incredible. If the Lakers never make that comeback, who knows how different the NBA looks during the 2000s.
THE MOMENT: 2001 Playoffs // NBA Finals // Sixers vs. Lakers // Game 1 // Score: 101–99, Sixers // 54 seconds left in overtime // Allen Iverson executes a perfect and unguardable step-back reverse crossover, pulls up, hits a 16-foot jumper, then executes his defender, Tyronn Lue, who’d fallen down, by stepping over him.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Rick Fox overthrew a pass down to Shaq in the post. It sailed completely over his head and into the stands. Two things here: First, do you even understand how shook you have to be to overthrow a pass to Shaq? He’s goddamn Shaq. He’s 10 feet tall. The Lakers had been literally unbeatable that year in the playoffs. That the absolutely inferior Sixers had somehow managed to stay close to them for sure shook Fox.20 Second, I wrote about the wonderfulness of the Iverson move for Grant-land during the summer of 2014. Here’s that excerpt:
Iverson rates as the Coolest NBA Player of All Time, and The Step Over was the single dopest moment of his career.
1. It happened during Game 1 of the NBA Finals, so you have to calculate for that. Big stage, big consequences, lots of eyes.
2. It was an away game, so you have to keep that in mind, too.
3. The Sixers were playing the Lakers, a team that, if I’m remembering correctly, was something like 94–0 through the season and playoffs up to that point.
4. It was overtime, with less than a minute left, and the Sixers were up by two before Iverson hit the shot that preceded The Step-Over.
5. Iverson had already been brilliant the entire game, so you kind of had the feeling that he was maybe about to do something remarkable. (He actually ended up finishing with an unreal 48 points, 6 assists, and 5 steals, which is all the more crazy when you consider that nobody else on that Sixers team could shoot from farther than 4 feet away from the basket, so Iverson was always basically playing 1-on-5 whenever his team had the ball.)
6. When The Step-Over happened, it happened DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF THE LAKERS’S BENCH. They were all standing up and seemed to be closing in on him, which definitely made it better.
It was like he was standing in the middle of a crocodile pit. What a superhero.
7. He set up The Step-Over by completing a ridiculous step-back-crossover-into-a-jumper move.
8. The jumper, that beautifulBeautifulBEAUTIFUL thing, never even considered hitting the rim. It just swished straight through. The swish kind of matters, too.
9. Iverson fully understood what he’d done as soon as it happened. He paused for a moment, then looked down at Tyronn Lue with a gravity-shifting amount of smugness and contempt, stuck a sword through his heart, then stepped over the body he’d just dead-ed.
10. And of course Marv Albert was calling the game, and gave the moment a triumphant “. . . and steps OVER Tyronn Lue” framing.
The whole thing was flawless.
All of that is still true, and will always be true.
1. He set a Finals record for (a) threes in a half (it’s not a record anymore—Ray Allen hit 7 threes in a half during the 2010 Finals) and (b) most points scored in a half (that one still stands).
2. He and Jordan appeared on the cover of an issue of Sports Illustrated in May and the subtitle of the article was “Michael Jordan and his No. 1 rival, Portland’s Clyde Drexler, are primed for a playoff showdown.”
3. The Rockets had the first pick. They chose Hakeem Olajuwon, although at the time his name was Akeem Olajuwon. He said he put the H on the front of it because it stood for all the “hoes” he was going to get as an NBA player. (That’s not true.) (He actually said he was changing it from Akeem to Hakeem because he wanted it to be the proper Arabic spelling.)
4. They chose a power forward named Sidney Green. He played for the Bulls for three seasons.
5. Made maybe even more upsetting because Zo’s shot went through the hoop with at least 0.7 second left but the clock operator just let it run until the buzzer sounded. They were doing wild shit in the ’90s.
6. I’d like to say, though, that it was not rough for me. Rick Fox was on that Celtics team and so I just always loved seeing him lose, so that’s one thing. But also, he was the one dribbling the ball up the court for the Celtics when they got hit with the 10-second violation. It was like Petty Christmas for me.
7. He super did not want to shoot those free throws. He had actually just made two a minute or so earlier. He should’ve been fine. He was just shook, though. I don’t blame him. If I’d have been in that spot and the ref called a foul and I had to shoot those free throws, I’d have been like, “No, thank you,” and then walked right the fuck out the stadium.
8. The “Kiss of Death,” specifically. And he said in an interview in 2006 that he was blowing it at Joe Kleine. They’d been blowing kisses at each other during the series. I don’t imagine Joe Kleine pretended to kiss Mario Elie in too many more games after that.
9. Additionally, he scored a career high 46 points that game.
10. Whoops.
11. Whoops again. (I just can’t trust a guy whose name rhymes with bologna. It’s the worst meat of all for your name to rhyme with.) (Better meat-rhyming names: Jake [steak], Chief Keef [beef], Phil [veal].)
12. Even as an impartial watcher, this was such a great and exciting moment. Johnson had surprised everyone by coming off the bench and putting up 31 on the Jazz in Game 3. So you add that with his buzzer beater in Game 4 and it just really felt like we were in the middle of an Eddie Johnson moment. Also: His post-shot celebration, where he just fucking high-stepped down the court until Barkley caught him and picked him up, was fantastic. Also, also: They were playing in The Summit, which held a little over 16,000 people for basketball games in 1997 but looked like there were something like 70,000–75,000 in there. All in all, it was just a great thing to watch happen.
13. There was only a five-point differential between the teams over the last three games. It was great.
14. Utah haunted San Antonio during the ’90s. They made for great villains.
15. Another all-time great reaction.
18. WTF.
19. In retrospect, the alley-oop looks a lot like the big breakthrough moment for that version of the Lakers and their eventual dynasty.
20. This probably isn’t true. It was probably just a bad pass. It’s just I don’t ever want to pass up an opportunity to poke fun at Rick Fox.
WHAT HAPPENED IN THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”?
PART 3 (2002–2016)
THE MOMENT: 2002 Playoffs // Western Conference Finals // Kings vs. Lakers // Game 4 // Series: 2–1, Kings // Score: 99–97, Kings // 11.8 seconds left // Kobe Bryant drove to the rim and missed a contested layup. Shaq rebounded it, then short-armed a put-back attempt. Vlade Divac, hoping to rid the Lakers of another chance at a close bucket, slapped the ball out of the fray. Unfortunately for him, it went straight to Robert Horry, who calmly collected it, then hit a buzzer-beating three to win the game.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Vlade, who’d shot 8 of 10 on free throws in the game up until that point, had two free throws. He missed one of the two. Tough stretch for him, what with him having missed the free throw and then slapping the ball out to Horry. If he’d have either made both free throws or just not slapped the ball to Horry, the Kings probably would have won that game,1 then probably would have won
the series, too, after going up 3–1 with two of the remaining potential three games left at home. It’s hard to say that there was ever any string of reality where the Lakers don’t win the 2001 title (they were just so unstoppable that year), but you can for sure argue that they should’ve lost in 2000 to the Blazers and also in 2002 to the Kings. Shit’s crazy, man.2
THE MOMENT: 2004 Playoffs // Western Conference Semifinals // Lakers vs. Spurs // Game 5 // Series: 2–2 // Score: 72–71, Lakers // 5.4 seconds left // Tim Duncan received an inbounds pass at the right wing. The Lakers defense dissolved whatever it was that the play was supposed to be. Duncan, realizing things had turned to poop, dribbled at the top of the key and threw up a prayer over Shaq. It went in with 0.4 second left on the clock.3
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Karl Malone set a pick for Kobe Bryant on Devin Brown at the left wing near the three-point line. Robert Horry, then playing with the Spurs, was guarding Malone and so rather than bother with him that far away from the rim, he sank back and waited for Kobe to drive. Kobe pulled up and shot a jumper from just inside the three-point line. It went in, giving the Lakers a one-point lead. I don’t think Kobe Bryant ever, not one single time, missed a shot against the Spurs during the playoffs. I don’t want to talk about this anymore.4
THE MOMENT: 2005 Playoffs // NBA Finals // Spurs vs. Pistons // Game 5 // Series: 2–2 // Score: 93– 95, Pistons // 9.4 seconds left // Robert Horry inbounded the ball to Manu Ginobili in the left corner. Rasheed Wallace, who was guarding Horry as he inbounded the ball, ran over to try and trap Ginobili. Ginobili threw it back to Horry, who was now wide open. Horry shot a three. It rattled in, giving the Spurs a one-point lead. The Pistons missed their final shot. Spurs win.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Chauncey Billups missed a runner in the lane that would’ve given the Pistons a four-point lead with about 10 seconds to go. (The Pistons really should’ve won this game, and probably the series, too. The Spurs took a 2–0 lead and it looked for all the world like it was going to be a trouncing the rest of the way, then the Pistons, forever unshakable, won the next two games and looked to have Game 5 sewn up. Then Robert Horry, who for the rest of his life will be beloved in San Antonio, went fucking nuts in the fourth quarter and overtime to steal the game for the Spurs. He scored all 21 of his points in the last 17 minutes, including the last five for San Antonio and also 15 of their final 20. I would also like to point out here that I watched the whole fourth quarter and overtime of that game standing up and also with the TV on mute, which no doubt helped the Spurs.)
(Note: To write these three chapters, I had to watch game tape from each game to find all the information I needed. Mostly, it was a fun and interesting exercise. The ones I had to watch where the Spurs lost, however, were less fun and less interesting. It’s just hard to relive those moments, you know what I’m saying. Rewatching and reliving the Horry Game, though, has me in a real good mood and I don’t want to burn that off. As such, I’m going to cheat for the last two bad Moment Before “the Moment”s that the Spurs were involved in and just do them real quick right now: In 2006, Dirk Nowitzki hit an and-one to tie Game 7 of the 2006 Western Conference Semifinals. The Spurs lost that game in overtime. On the play before Dirk’s and-one, Manu hit a three to give the Spurs a three-point lead.5 In 2013, Ray Allen hit a step-back three to tie Game 6 of the 2013 NBA Finals. On the play before that, LeBron missed a three. Bosh grabbed the rebound and threw it to Allen. I hate it. I hate everything.6 I’ll fucking fight you.7)
THE MOMENT: 2006 Playoffs // Western Conference First Round // Suns vs. Lakers // Game 4 // Series: 2–1, Lakers // Score: 98–97, Suns // 6.1 seconds left in overtime // Kobe collected a jump ball that’d been tipped out to him, dribbled up the court on the left side, zagged his way over to the right elbow, then raised up and hit a game-winner at the buzzer.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: This is one of those games people point to when they want to talk about how great Kobe was, and rightfully so, given that he hit a shot at the end of regulation to tie the game and send it into overtime, and then he hit a shot at the end of overtime to win the game for the Lakers (as well as hitting the shot before the game-winner to cut the Suns’s lead to one), giving them a 3–1 lead in the series.8 On the play before Kobe’s game-winner, Steve Nash dribbled into a trap near the sideline between half court and the three-point line.9 He tried to call a timeout, but the nearby ref called a jump ball between him and the much bigger Luke Walton instead. He lost the jump ball, then six seconds later he lost the game.
THE MOMENT: 2008 Playoffs // Western Conference First Round // Suns vs. Spurs // Game 1 // Score: 104– 101, Suns // 12.6 seconds left in overtime // Tim Duncan received a pass from Manu Ginobili out at the right wing three-point line after setting a screen for Ginobili. Duncan, nobody within 28 feet of him, decided to shoot a three, which surprised everyone because he’s fucking Tim Duncan. It went in. It was the first three he’d made all season. Tim Duncan is my boyfriend.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: This was an all-time great game, if we’re talking about just watchability and enjoyability. Michael Finley hit a three near the end of regulation to tie the game (!), then Tim Duncan hit his three near the end of overtime to send it into a second overtime (!!), then Steve Nash hit a three near the end of the second overtime to tie it, setting up a potential third overtime (!!!), then Manu Ginobili hit a driving layup at the end of the second overtime to win it (!!!!). It was all great (though I’m sure it was less great if you’re a Suns fan).10 On the play before Tim’s three, Amar’e Stoudemire was whistled for an offensive foul, giving the ball back to the Spurs. I’m super against the charge as an offensive foul, but I’m 100 percent in favor of the charge as an offensive foul any time it helps out the Spurs.
THE MOMENT: 2009 Playoffs // Eastern Conference Finals // Magic vs. Cavs // Game 2 // Series: 1–0, Magic // Score: 95–93, Magic // 1 second left // LeBron James’s attempt to create a backdoor lob got rubbed out so he cut back up the floor to the top of the three-point line. He got a pass from Mo Williams, then threw up a prayer three-pointer over Hedo Turkoglu. It rattled in, miraculously. Cavs win. Neat moment.11
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Hedo Turkoglu had the ball out past the three-point line winding the clock down. Once it got to five seconds, he attacked, dribbling past Sasha Pavlovic into the lane.12 He pulled up just inside the free throw line, drilling a jumper over three Cavs, giving the Magic a one-point lead with one second left. I’d just like to take a moment to point out that in 2009, Dwight Howard was so good that he managed to drag a team where the second, third, and fourth best players were Hedo Turkoglu, Rashard Lewis and Rafer Alston13 to the Finals.
THE MOMENT: 2010 Playoffs // NBA Finals // Celtics vs. Lakers // Game 7 // Score: 73–76, Lakers // Just over a minute left // Ron Artest received a pass from Kobe Bryant late in the shot clock. He gave just enough of a feint to slow down Paul Pierce, then shot a three over him, giving the Lakers a six-point lead. He blew a double kiss to the sky.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Rasheed Wallace hit a three for Boston to cut the lead to three. Mostly I just wanted to bring up this shot because it lets me talk about how Artest ended up on the Lakers, which is one of my favorite things: In the minutes after Kobe and the Lakers lost the 2008 NBA Finals to the Celtics, Kobe was in the shower just being very mad and sad and heartbroken. Ron Artest walked in, told him he wanted to come to Los Angeles and play for the Lakers and help Kobe win a championship. Phil Jackson told that story during a radio interview and, wild as Artest may have been or might be, that’s a really good origin story. All of that means it’s pretty great he ended up being the one who hit the shot that really put the game out of reach for the Celtics in the 2010 Finals, even if it was pulverizing at the time.14
THE MOMENT: 2014 Playoffs // Western Conference First Round // Rockets vs. Blazers // Game 6 // Series: 3–2, Blazers // Score: 98–96, Rockets // 0.9 second left // Damian Lillard came flyin
g around a screen at the three-point line, clapping his hands at Nicolas Batum, who was inbounding the ball. Batum threw it to Lillard, who caught it, squared up, then shot a 27-footer. It splashed in. The Blazers win their first playoff series in 14 years.15
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Chandler Parsons grabbed a loose ball, then somehow flipped it up over his head into the basket.
THE MOMENT: 2016 Playoffs // NBA Finals // Cavs vs. Warriors // Game 7 // Score: 89–89 // Just over a minute left // Kyrie Irving dribbled out a bit of the clock before the Cavs ran a pick and roll to get Klay Thompson off of him and Steph Curry onto him. After they did so, Irving put Steph into the torture chamber, dancing on him a bit with the ball before pulling up for a three. It went in, giving the Cavs a lead they would not give up. The Cavs win their first title in franchise history.
THE MOMENT BEFORE “THE MOMENT”: Steph Curry missed a step-back three over Irving. And that was a big thing—Curry feasted all season on that shot—but we have to rewind things back two more plays to get the full effect of Irving’s three. With just under two minutes left in a tied and ultra-tense Game 7, Andre Iguodala grabbed a rebound, then sprinted out into a fast break. They had a 2-on-1 with him and Steph against a back-pedaling J.R. Smith. It should’ve been an easy go-ahead bucket, and maybe against any other team it would’ve been. But against the Cavs, on that particular night, with the weight of the universe on the line, it was not. Iguodala passed it off to Steph, who immediately passed it back to Iguodala. Iguodala gathered it, ducked underneath Smith’s outstretched arms, then laid it up. It was perfectly played and perfectly shot. And then LeBron James, who’d sprinted into position from about a mile away, erased it. He jumped, calculated the angles, calculated the age of the earth, calculated the exact age of the solar system, and then slapped the ball off the glass.