Saturday, May 23, 2009

The Black Mamba Strikes Back


Charlie Klein

I guess we should just expect performances like this every night from either LeBron James or Kobe Bryant. The Black Mamba's 41 points carried the Los Angeles Lakers to a 2-1 series advantage over the Denver Nuggets last night in Denver.

Bryant hit a three point shot to put the Lakers up 96-95, a lead that they would hold until time expired. This game was almost an exact carbon copy of Game 1 in Los Angeles. The Nuggets led for the balance of the game outplaying and outshooting the Lake Show. Yet it was the combination of a mammoth scoring night from Bryant and one titanic defensive play from Trevor Ariza that again proved the recipe for succes for Los Angeles.

When the same thing happens to oneself twice, one has to wonder why he ever let it happen the second time. If that person, or in this case the Denver Nuggets, can only look to the poor trigger play of Anthony Carter in Game 1 or Kenyon Martin in Game 3 as the reason why the Lakers find themselves sitting in the catbird's seat in the Western Conference Finals. Really, someone more responsible has to be given the keys George Karl's Aston Martin than those two.

Game 4 in Denver should hold the key to this series. If the Lakers take a 3-1 series lead, do not expect the Zen Master and Co. allow the Nuggets back into things. The Nuggets have to do a better job of sweating the small stuff and get simple things like inbounds passes to the court if they want to prove they are better than the Lakers.

"How do you stop the unstoppable? You can't."

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