Bryant Flies to the Rescue

Near the end of a day that for him began before dawn, Kobe Bryant sat on the Staples Center floor, his arms over his head, his game-winning shot having left his fingertips with less than a half-second remaining.

Bryant made it back from his criminal hearing in Colorado for most of the basketball game Friday night, ducking in between the first and second quarters to a standing ovation from fans that had held their breath since Kareem Rush was introduced with the Laker starters.

He touched fists with teammates already gathered near the Laker bench, took another standing ovation when he subbed in for the start of the second quarter and became a basketball player again. Bryant came off the bench for the first time in four years, pushed a smile across his face, and tried to play it away, all of it riding on one last jump shot.

And when it might have felt as though his day would never end, he pumped Jon Barry into the air, launched a 21-foot jumper that was true, and pushed the Lakers to a 101-99 victory over the Denver Nuggets. The win, much of it due to Shaquille O’Neal’s 26 points and 11 rebounds, ended their losing streak at two games and put another potential distraction behind them. The Lakers are 19-5, on this Friday night just barely, the final buzzer sounding as Bryant’s shot reached the top of its arc.

“It’s been a long day, a long draining day,” Bryant said. “I wanted to get out and play, just play the game.”

The Nuggets scored nine consecutive points near the end of regulation to tie the score, 99-99. Rookie Carmelo Anthony scored the last two on free throws with 2.5 seconds remaining, and overtime loomed.

But Bryant took an inbounds pass from Devean George, dribbled left to the top of the key, faked Barry away and made the shot. As he left the floor, he held his left hand over his head and flicked his fingers downward, a shot good, a game over.

He had missed his previous four shots, all from distance, most as the Lakers’ nine-point lead fell away over the last two minutes. The Lakers’ last play, which began with those 2.5 seconds left, was drawn to go elsewhere. Bryant said he “called an audible” and attacked Barry.

“Once I got him in the air,” Bryant said, “I knew he was done. I just had to get the shot off in time.”

He finished with 13 points on five-of-14 shooting in 31 minutes.

O’Neal carried much of the early burden, but he missed three of four free-throw attempts in the fourth quarter, two with 1:04 remaining. He left without speaking to reporters. Karl Malone, who had 11 points and eight rebounds in 27 minutes, all but two before the fourth quarter, and Gary Payton also left before reporters were allowed into the locker room.

Bryant’s second half, in which he took 12 shots, many of them difficult attempts, hung over the locker room.

“Kobe gave us a great first half, with five assists,” Phil Jackson said. “He helped us generate some energy out there. But, I didn’t anticipate that he would take tough shots. He tried to take some shots that I wouldn’t recommend him to take.”

Bryant ran with the energy of a man cooped up in a courtroom and then on an airplane for hours, yet played with some of the imprecision of a man who’d had 20 minutes to prepare for an NBA basketball game. Despite the adrenaline surge in the arena when Bryant stripped away his warmups, a large Laker lead dwindled in the middle of the second quarter, then was 10 again by halftime.

Anthony scored 24 points to lead six Nuggets in double figures. They looked done, however, behind by as many as 19 in the third quarter and 14 four minutes into the fourth. After that, Bryant missed some shots, the Lakers committed turnovers 17 through 20, and the Nuggets suddenly were there, two points back, one point back, and finally tied.

“I wasn’t happy with the choices and the way we were playing down the stretch,” Jackson said.

So they either gave the ball to Bryant or he took it, one last shot at the conclusion of one endless day.

Derek Fisher called it “extremely courageous on his part.”

“I’m sure it would have been easy for him to go home and be with his family and go back to work tomorrow,” Fisher said. “We didn’t like the position we were in, in terms of having to make that shot.... But still, it was courageous of him.”

Bryant, still dressed in a wool cap and heavy jacket, smiled.

“It’s just the irony of it,” he said, “how it all played out.”