derek fisher

Joey Ramirez

On its home court, Orlando had the opportunity to tie up the 2009 NBA Finals. Kobe Bryant and Derek Fisher had another idea.

As with most nights, Bryant was the engine of the Lakers’ offense. He led the way with 32 points (despite needing 31 shots), while also throwing in eight assists and seven rebounds.

The master of hitting contested shots, Bryant was able to cash in the face of tough defense from Mickael Pietrus.

Bryant averaged 32.4 points and 7.4 assists throughout the series, earning himself Finals MVP honors.

On this night, it was his mid-range game that stung Orlando, as Bryant routinely sunk tough jumper after tough jumper.

But it was Bryant’s passing that pushed the Lakers over the top.

Down by five with about 35 seconds left, Bryant led a fast-break, spun his way through four defenders and flipped the ball over his shoulder to a trailing Pau Gasol.

The ridiculous assist brought the Lakers close enough for Derek Fisher to sink the game-tying 3-pointer with 4.6 seconds remaining.

And when the game was tied with 35 seconds left in overtime, it was again Bryant’s distributing that set the table for victory.

He backed down Pietrus and waited for Orlando to send a double-team at him. When the second defender came, he dished to Fisher at the top of the arc.

The point guard delivered, putting the Lakers on the path to a 99-91 win and a 3-1 series lead.

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Lakers History: Bryant-Fisher Backcourt Sinks Orlando in Finals

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“For gold is tried in the fire and acceptable men in the furnace of adversity”.

Two days after the game that ruined perfection, the defending champions found themselves in the uncomfortable position of having to react and restore order.

Allen Iverson’s iconic 48-point performance in an overtime upset had given Philadelphia an unexpected series lead after Game 1 of the 2001 Finals, snapping a 19-game winning streak that had started in early April.

Yes, after a rocky journey through the 2000 postseason, Phil Jackson’s 2001 squad demolished its competition by winning the last eight games of the regular season and the first 11 of the playoffs – sweeping Portland, Sacramento, and San Antonio along the way and remaining unbeaten over a period longer than 2 months.

The Sixers were the No. 1 seed from the Eastern Conference but far from a formidable squad, needing 7 games to get past Toronto and Milwaukee before shocking the world in Downtown Los Angeles.

This was a big test, the ultimate show of character and a chance to even things up before heading to Philly for the next 3 games of the series.

Kobe Bryant was ready though, draining the team’s first basket with a long jumper from the top of the key. Despite playing 52 minutes in Game 1, the product of Lower Merion HS dropped 12 in the opening stanza to set the tone.

Shaquille O’Neal took over in the second quarter, and by halftime he had a 17-point, 13-rebound double-double.

Larry Brown’s Sixers were held fast and managed to get to intermission only down by a deuce. They also put up a fight throughout most of the third before the levy broke.

An inspired Derek Fisher nailed a three-pointer with 18.1 seconds to go, extending the lead to 10. It wouldn’t be his last clutch bucket, as he hit another 25-footer in the 4th when Philadelphia had managed to get within a triple.

Kobe ended up with 31 points, eight rebounds, six assists and a pair of steals and blocks. Shaq fell just short of a quadruple-double, finishing with 28 &amp; 20, plus nine assists and a ridiculous eight blocks. A.I. was kept to 23 points on 29 shots.

However, it was the third guy in double digits that sealed the deal. Veterans Brian Shaw and Ron Harper provided some timely baskets, but Fisher’s 14 – and the precise moments when he got them – wound up being the difference.

Turns out that was the last time live basketball was played in STAPLES Center that season, as the Lakers then swept all 3 in Philadelphia en route to their second consecutive championship.

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Lakers History: Defending Champs Get Even With the Sixers in 2001 Finals

Some people just have that clutch gene, you know?

In the spring of 2004, Derek Fisher was already a 3-time champion who’d started and shared the backcourt with Kobe Bryant in the 2001 and 2002 Finals.

However, the arrival of a future Hall of Famer like Gary Payton relegated him to a bench role for the 2003-04 season – one in which the Lakers were gunning for their fourth title in five seasons.

Never one to complain, Fish adapted, and when he got his chance to shine again, he took it and ran. Literally (more on that in a second).

The occasion was Game 5 of the Western Conference semifinals, facing none other than the defending-champions San Antonio Spurs.

Gregg Popovich’s squad jumped to a 2-0 series lead, extending a winning streak to 17 games after a torrid end to the regular season and sweeping the Memphis Grizzlies in the first round.

L.A. was a different animal though, winning games 3 and 4 to tie the series, setting up a pivotal return to Texas.

The stakes couldn’t have been any higher, but a signature of the Kobe-Shaq era was their performance under pressure. Phil Jackson’s team won the first two quarters in an extremely low-scoring affair and led by 16 points with 3:59 to go until the end of the quarter.

Done deal? Not so fast. The Spurs reacted and shut down L.A., limiting them to a mere 10 points over the next 16 minutes.

And they tasted victory too. Guarded by Shaquille O’Neal in the waning seconds of the ballgame, Tim Duncan nailed an impossible shot from the top of the key as he fell to his left. He later admitted he didn’t see the ball go in, but his jumper gave the Spurs a one-point lead with 0.4 seconds.

Had it not been for what happened next, Duncan’s dagger would’ve been one of those iconic playoff moments that get passed down from generation to generation.

“One lucky shot deserves another,” O'Neal said after the game.

With less than half of a second in the game clock, the Lakers were looking for a lob to Shaq or for Kobe on a curl. When the Spurs denied those, survival instinct kicked in, and the open man got the chance to be the hero.

In one of the most incredible sequences in the history of the game, Fisher caught the inbounds pass from Payton and in a single motion fired a turnaround lefty shot over the outstretched arms of Manu Ginobili.

Yes, Fisher immediately sprinted toward the locker room before the crowd at the then AT&amp;T Center could even process what they had just witnessed.

“I just wanted to get out of there and not give them an opportunity to think that we didn't believe it went in,” Fisher said, showing incredible presence of mind in arguably the wildest moment of his career.

Despite the Spurs’ protests, the call stood and the Lakers won the game – snapping San Antonio’s 17-game home winning streak – before closing out the series in Game 6 in Los Angeles.

The purple and gold made it all the way to the NBA Finals that year, losing to the Detroit Pistons in 5 games.

Fisher left in free agency that summer, but returned to the franchise in 2007 and helped the Lakers to another pair of titles in 2009 and 2010.

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Lakers History: The Night of Fisher’s Jumper With 0.4 Seconds Left

Mike Trudell

Throughout history, every opponent gets up for the Lakers.

The 2009 Western Conference semifinals weren’t any different, with the Houston Rockets upsetting Phil Jackson’s squad in Game 1 and threatening to return to Texas with a commanding series lead.

Fresh off a painful loss in the 2008 Finals, the purple and gold won 65 games in the regular season to become the No. 1 seed in the West. However, a scrappy team led by the artist formerly known as Ron Artest loomed as a serious threat – ready to shock the world or to go down swinging.

“It's the playoffs,” Kobe Bryant said. “This is what it's about.”

The Lakers jumped to a commanding 14-point lead at the end of the first quarter, but Houston punched back, tying the score heading into halftime. It was a clear foreshadowing of the type of back and forth series we’d eventually see.

That night of May 9th though, the Lakers were done messing around. A 16-4 run pushed their lead to double digits one more time, and the rest of the way was a simple matter of holding on.

Well, maybe not so simple, given the number of technical fouls being doled out. Lamar Odom, Luke Walton, and Luis Scola received techs toward the end of the third quarter.

Moments later, Derek Fisher was called for a flagrant foul after colliding with the Argentine and got a bloody cut on his head. Fish was ejected.

“We are playing basketball, there is a lot of contact taking place,” Bryant said. “If you are going to be physical you have to expect to get physical back.”

Tempers never cooled down and neither did the back and forth between Bryant and Artest, who went mano a mano throughout most of the night.

Kobe finished with 40 points on an excellent 16-of-27 from the field. Artest had 25 (4-for-7 from beyond the arc) and five assists but was eventually ejected in the fourth.

Pau Gasol had a monster performance with 22 points (on 13 shots), 14 boards, four assists and four blocks – manning the middle (Andrew Bynum managed just 8 minutes) and getting the best of Yao Ming, who finished with 12 points on just four shot attempts.

Kobe knew then and there that they were in for a dog fight.

“We are being tested and this is fun,” he said.

Lo and behold, the Rockets forced a Game 7 before running out of gas. The Lakers dismantled them at STAPLES Center by an 89-70 score and eventually defeated the Orlando Magic in the NBA Finals for their 15th title in franchise history.

The following year they added Artest to their squad and he played a key role in beating Boston in the 2010 Finals. In 2011, Artest changed his name to Metta World Peace, and went on to become one of the franchise’s most beloved players of the decade.

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Lakers History: Kobe & Metta Battle Before Winning a Ring Together

<strong>Game Time Update</strong>: The start time for the game on <strong>1/17/24</strong> at Crypto.com Arena has been moved to 5:30pm PT