It's History

June 2008

It's History

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. - Amid the buzz over Celtics-Lakers lore, the Lakers gathered for practice yesterday and gave the impression they expect the two games between the teams earlier this season to have little impact on the NBA Finals



"I mean, we're a different team than when we played them in November and December," said Kobe Bryant, whose team lost both

The Lakers had Andrew Bynum then, and the developing young center scored 4 points in the first game and 8 in the second, doing little to slow Kevin Garnett.

Bryant made only 15 of 46 shots combined.

Bynum improved but is injured and has been replaced by Pau Gasol, whose passing ability in the Lakers' triangle offense helped facilitate Bryant's run to the Most Valuable Player award

"We played last year, basically," coach Phil Jackson said. "The end of December, so that's a long time away."
Just like 1987, the last time the storied rivals met in the Finals

"I don't think any of these players have a semblance of an idea what the rivalries were in the '60s or '80s," Jackson said.

Bryant begged to differ

"I remember it like it was yesterday. My grandfather used to send me tapes of the series, and I used to just watch them over and over," said Bryant, 29, who spent part of his youth in Italy, where his father's basketball career took the family

Someone asked Bryant if he recalled Kevin McHale's clothesline foul of Kurt Rambis, now a Lakers assistant coach, in Game 4 of the 1984 Finals

"Who doesn't remember that?" Bryant said. "That's the intensity of what it used to be . . . You do that now, you'd get suspended for a week."
He doesn't predict the same physical intensity of the old rivalry

"Nah, you can't put wood on people like you used to like that," he said. "It's just the nature of the beast. Nowadays you can't do that too often. Aside from that, we all know each other, from 14 years old we all grew up, we all know each other."
The teams' makeups and rotations have shifted, but the Lakers coaching staff is puzzling over many of the same matchup issues

"We haven't really come to any conclusions," assistant coach Tex Winter said. "It's a question of who you're going to put on [Paul] Pierce. If you put Kobe on him, then Kobe's got to really concentrate on his job, his responsibility and got to stay attached, which is hard for Kobe to do

"And yet I don't think you want to put Kobe on [Ray] Allen because Allen has always been very effective against Kobe. Kobe just won't pay enough attention to him. The way he can shoot the ball, he's a player you've got to pay attention to. And so it goes, all right down the way."

There is Garnett to contend with, too, and forward Lamar Odom suggested he might try to draw him outside

"He's a matchup problem for everyone," Odom said. "He's that good. That big. Hopefully we can bring him out on the perimeter and space the court out and slice and dice and use our quickness."

Winter also suggested the possibility of doubling Garnett, saying "whether or not we can contain him with individual defense is very questionable," especially because Gasol, Winter noted, is a finesse player

"He's not a real aggressive power player. In fact, right on down the line, we feel like we're more of a finesse team. But in these playoffs, I'm not so sure you can be."
History will be the backdrop for Game 1 Thursday night at TD Banknorth Garden

"I think it adds more fluff for this week leading up to it - all the classic games and a lot more to talk about, about the series," Bryant said. "What they had back then was something that was truly magical. What we're trying to do is set our own mark on history."

Much has changed, but some things haven't

"The towns are still the same," Jackson said. "A lot of the same type of people. Beantown is still Beantown, that's for sure. They've won a baseball World Series now, so they're not so bedraggled."