Los Angeles Lakers Blog – Page 72 – NBA Blog

Torn Achilles knocks Kobe out for season

Kobe Bryant had surgery Saturday on his torn Achilles tendon, ending the season for the Los Angeles Lakers star.

Teammates and coaches say Bryant is determined to return quickly from the biggest injury of his career. General manager Mitch Kupchak thinks it’s realistic the 34-year-old guard could be ready for next season’s opener in the fall.

Bryant was hurt late in the Lakers’ 118-116 win over Golden State on Friday night. Lakers trainer Gary Vitti says Bryant’s tendon was completely torn. Bryant stayed in the game to make two free throws.

Kupchak says the Lakers haven’t considered parting ways with Bryant, who will make nearly $30.5 million next year.

— Reported by the Associated Press

Kobe unleashes epic 47-point game on Blazers

It didn’t matter that it was the Rose Garden. The ”M-V-P!” chant for Kobe Bryant was loud and clear.

Bryant scored a season-high 47 points [plus eight rebounds, five assists, three steals and four blocks] and carried the Los Angeles Lakers closer to a playoff berth with a 113-106 victory over the short-handed but tenacious Portland Trail Blazers on Wednesday night.

The Lakers moved a full game up on the Utah Jazz for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference.

”We’ve got no breathing room at all,” Bryant said. ”I’m still on edge. We’ve got to win three more games and we’re in.”

Portland, missing the playoffs for the second straight season, has lost nine straight, the most since an 11-game skid in the 2005-06 season. Rookie Damian Lillard led the Blazers with a career-high 38 points.

Pau Gasol had 23 points, seven rebounds and nine assists, while Dwight Howard added 20 points and 10 rebounds for the Lakers. Bryant was 18 of 18 from the free throw line and played the entire game, determined to pull out a win after trailing early.

”What he (Bryant) is doing is phenomenal. He’s determined to get us in the playoffs,” Lakers coach Mike D’Antoni said. ”That’s what happens when you open your mouth and guarantee that we’ll get in the playoffs.”

Bryant vowed in late February that his team would make it to the postseason. The Lakers wrap up the regular season at home with games against playoff-bound Golden State, San Antonio and Houston.

— Reported by Anne M. Peterson of the Associated Press

Lakers guard Steve Nash frustrated with season

Steve Nash was back at the Rose Garden on Wednesday, the site of the collision that broke his left leg in the Los Angeles Lakers’ second game of the season, sidelining him for nearly two months.

Only this time around, he was dealing with a right hip and hamstring injury that kept him out of the game against the Portland Trail Blazers and caused him to miss all or part of the Lakers’ past six games before it.

Seeing Nash make his way to the training room for treatment before the game rather than head to the court for a crucial matchup as the Lakers fight for a playoff spot begged the question: Has this been the most frustrating season of his career?

“Right up there, if not the most frustrating,” said Nash, a 17-year veteran. “I’ve played a long time, so I can’t remember all those years, but it’s frustrating. Maybe it’s because of the freshness, but it feels the most frustrating for sure.”

Nash, who hurt his hip March 25 at Golden State and has suffered discomfort in his hamstring stemming from the injury ever since, said he is improving but added, “There’s still a question for Friday.”

— Reported by Dave McMenamin of ESPN Los Angeles

Video: Kobe Bryant scores 47 points in Lakers win over Blazers

Kobe Bryant was amazing for the Lakers Wednesday night in Portland against the Trail Blazers, shooting 14-of-27 and hitting 18-of-18 free throws to finish with 47 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 steals and 4 blocks.

Here are video highlights of Kobe scoring 47 points. Amazing performance:

Metta World Peace will play Tuesday, Steve Nash will not

Metta World Peace will play Tuesday against New Orleans, 12 days after undergoing surgery for torn cartilage in his left knee.

Steve Nash, however, will not play for the Lakers and was doubtful for Wednesday’s game at Portland, Lakers Coach Mike D’Antoni said.

Tuesday marks the fourth game Nash has been sidelined because of hip and hamstring soreness. He sat out most of two other games because of the injuries.

World Peace’s return will ease the load for Kobe Bryant, D’Antoni said.

— Reported by Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times

Clippers beat Lakers 109-95, win division title

Chris Paul held up the red T-shirt reading ‘Can’t Stop Los Angeles’ for a quick postgame photo. He didn’t put it on, and neither did his Clippers teammates.

There was no celebrating on court or in the locker room after they beat the Lakers 109-95 on Sunday to clinch the Clippers’ first Pacific Division title in franchise history against a team that has long overshadowed them.

”It just feels like something we were supposed to do,” said Paul, who had 24 points and 12 assists. ”It means we’re headed in the right direction. We’re not satisfied. We understand this is something small compared to the big picture.”

Blake Griffin had 24 points and 12 rebounds as the playoff-bound Clippers swept the Lakers 4-0 for the first time since Donald Sterling bought the team in 1981.

The 1974-75 team, known as the Buffalo Braves, had the franchise’s only other sweep of the Lakers.

Fans chanted, ”Sweep! Sweep!” in the closing seconds.

Sterling accepted a congratulatory handshake from a fan after the game…

Jamal Crawford had 20 points off the bench, DeAndre Jordan had 13 rebounds and Caron Butler scored 14 points for the Clippers, who knew that even if they lost, they could have clinched later Sunday if Utah won at Golden State. Utah defeated the Warriors 97-90..

Dwight Howard scored 25 points, including 9 of 13 free throws, for the Lakers, who played without injured starters Steve Nash and Metta World Peace. Kobe Bryant added 25 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds, and Pau Gasol had 12 points and 13 rebounds as the Lakers’ three-game winning streak ended.

— Reported by Beth Harris of the Associated Press

Lakers games are also broadcast in Korean

For years, the Lakers claimed a steady fan base in the sprawling Korean American community, but this season the intensity has been amplified — with games now broadcast in Korean, a first in the NBA.

Time Warner Cable, which invested nearly $3 billion for regional TV rights to Lakers games for the next two decades, hired four Korean Americans as play-by-play announcers and color commentators, adding a fifth person just days ago.

For Park and others, it has brought a new intimacy to the action.

“I’m learning who the players really are, not their names only,” says Park, a grocery store clerk who grew up in Seoul.

Daniel Lee, an attorney who practices in Koreatown, said that while it’s a “big deal” for his parents’ generation to now be able to follow the local basketball team, the broadcasts add a new dimension for him as well.

— Reported by Anh Do of the Los Angeles Times

Kobe Bryant feels worn out

It was bound to happen sooner or later. The effect of all those minutes is taking a toll on Kobe Bryant.

What was left of him after playing all but 73 seconds the previous two games and 42 more minutes in the Los Angeles Lakers’ 86-84 win over the Memphis Grizzlies on Friday night could barely get up out of the chair afterward.

“I’m f-ing tired,” Bryant said, when asked why his voice sounded so rough. Bryant is one of the best-conditioned athletes on the planet. He puts his body through rigorous workouts during the season and over the summers to be able to handle workloads like this. But even he might have a limit.

— Reported by Ramona Shelburne of ESPN Los Angeles

Kobe, Lakers hold off Grizzlies 86-84

Dwight Howard got in the way when Mike Conley drove the lane in the waning seconds, doing his delicate best to alter Conley’s potential game-deciding shot without fouling.

When Conley couldn’t score over Howard, the Los Angeles Lakers could exhale – one more victory in their desperate playoff push.

Kobe Bryant had 24 points and nine assists, Pau Gasol added 19 points, and the Lakers stayed in the final playoff position in the Western Conference with an 86-84 victory over the Memphis Grizzlies on Friday night.

Howard hit a free throw with 4.1 seconds left before playing solid defense on Conley’s final shot attempt, and the Lakers won their third straight in the final weeks of their push for a postseason spot. Los Angeles (40-36) barely leads Utah (40-37) – and everybody on the Lakers’ high-priced roster is aware of their situation…

Howard had nine points and 10 rebounds, while Earl Clark and Antawn Jamison contributed 13 points apiece off the bench as the Lakers won without injured starters Steve Nash and Metta World Peace. Los Angeles also avoided getting swept in its season series with the Grizzlies, whose four-game winning streak ended.

But it wasn’t over until Conley, who scored 21 points in a stellar performance, missed a potential go-ahead jumper with 5 seconds left and another layup before the buzzer. The playoff-bound Grizzlies couldn’t score in the final 2 1/2 minutes, and they gave some of the credit to the Lakers’ desperate defense…

Memphis’ Marc Gasol had 11 points, eight rebounds and seven assists in a lively matchup with his brother. Zach Randolph added 15 points as the Grizzlies fell one game behind Denver for the fourth seed in the West.

— Reported by Greg Beacham of the Associated Press

Kobe Bryant maxing out his minutes, production

Kobe Bryant will always be associated with the number 81, and with good reason. But here are two more digits tied to Bryant that are just as eye-popping: 79.

As in 79 seconds, the total amount of time Bryant has sat in the Los Angeles Lakers’ last two games — both wins — coming just shy of going the distance and playing the maximum 96 minutes.

Bryant scoring in the 80s as a 27-year-old was one thing. But to play two entire games in a row as a 34-year-old nursing a bum left ankle that exacerbated a bone spur in his left foot? And then to not only play that much time, but to average 21 points, 12.5 assists, 10 rebounds, three steals and one blocked shot? Well, that’s another thing altogether.

“Hopefully all those minutes that he’s playing won’t affect him in a negative way down the road,” Pau Gasol said. “He’s giving it all. He knows the importance of this time of the year, and he’s just fully working and fully playing at his best.”

— Reported by Dave McMenamin of ESPN Los Angeles