- [Narrator] No matter what happens,
we're about to see some history.
It's June 4, 2000, and we're in Los Angeles
for Game 7 of the NBA Western Conference Finals
between the Lakers and the Portland Trailblazers.
The Blazers are down four with under a minute left.
They desperately need a stop
to preserve their chance of completing
one of the most impressive series comebacks ever.
Kobe Bryant has the ball,
and if he finds the Lakers a basket,
he can help secure the win and complete
one of the most impressive fourth-quarter comebacks ever.
This moment will help decide which rally falls short
and which will make history.
Before we see it, let's remember
how those dueling comebacks happened.
The characters involved and the critical moments
that might get forgotten behind this critical end game.
Let's rewind.
There are some familiar faces out here.
Guys who've already been part of this rivalry.
Like the All-Stars on the floor.
For the Lakers, that's Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant,
two guys who joined forces in '96,
helped eliminate the Blazers from the playoffs
in '97 and '98, and reached new heights
to make this league-best Lakers' season happen.
Kobe had a breakthrough year,
earning his second All-Star berth.
He's emerged as a genuine co-leader of this squad,
and really stepped it up in LA's back and forth
first-round defeat of the Sacramento Kings.
But, Shaq is still the main event,
and his stats this year were obscene.
He won unanimous MVP, or sorry, almost unanimous.
Then, he kept it going with some monumental games
in LA's second-round victory over the Phoenix Suns.
The Blazers meanwhile traded leading scorer
Isaiah Rider in the offseason,
but held onto young Rasheed Wallace.
Tall, loud, versatile and a first-time All-Star in 2000.
Sheed leads a more diffuse but extremely powerful offense.
And, Portland is still helmed by Mike Dunleavy,
last season's coach of the year.
Familiar faces on both sides, so what's different?
What changed to help these two teams,
both of whom got smoked by the Spurs
in last season's playoffs become the best of the West?
They each added some useful veterans
with deep playoff experience,
and by trading Rider, the Blazers got
a reliable second scorer in Steve Smith.
Smith was instrumental in Portland's
decisive second-round victory over the mighty Utah Jazz.
But, the most important changes to these teams
all rippled from the same splash.
In 1998 after winning their third straight NBA Championship,
the Chicago Bulls began to fall apart.
Phil Jackson left as coach,
Michael Jordan retired months later,
and the rest of Jerry Krause's club self destructed.
This matchup contains all kinds of shrapnel
from that explosion.
The biggest piece is Jackson,
who took just a year off post-Bulls
before grabbing the Lakers job.
This season was his first coaching LA,
and he fashioned the Lakers into an elite defense
while teaching Kobe and Shaq the triangle offense.
It helped to add another Chicago champion to the mix,
tall point guard Ron Harper.
But, Phil's old friends aren't all on his side.
One of the most essential new Blazers
is former Bulls star Scottie Pippen.
The Bulls punted Scottie to Houston days after MJ retired.
Then, before this season,
Portland traded like half their roster
to Houston to bring in the 34-year-old star.
Ex-Bulls on both sides played a part
in the early drama of this series.
After Shaq commanded a Lakers blowout in game one,
the Blazers' three-headed monster engineered
a stunning blowout of their own
on the road in game two.
LA's campaign to snatch back home-court advantage
came down to the closing moments of game three.
With a minute and change left,
it was Pippen who overpowered Kobe
to tie things up for the home team.
Seconds later, it was Pippen who had a chance
to build a lead, but threw the ball straight
into the hands of Glen Rice.
And, when the Lakers needed what would end up being
the winning bucket, there was Harper in the corner.
2-1 Lakers.
In game four, Harper and Rice, the birthday boy,
both came up big.
After those two road victories,
the Lakers had just about wrapped up a trip to the Finals.
And, here in the moment, Pippen's guarding the ball,
and Harper's available for a kickout.
Phil's on the sidelines sporting some hardware.
This series and this moment
are brought to you in large part
by the swift demolition of the Chicago Bulls dynasty.
But, wait, I just mentioned the Lakers were once
up 3-1 in the series.
How did they end up clinging to a small lead
in the final seconds of a game seven?
Well, the Blazers came back.
With the Lakers hungry to end the thing at home
in game five, Pipped broke the emergency inspiration glass.
He showed his teammates the championship ring.
And, Pippen himself may have had some extra motivation.
Coach Jackson entered game five still pissed
about a hard foul Pippen had put on John Salley,
and told his old Bulls star to his face
that he should have been suspended.
Pippen responded with an excellent game,
despite playing with two gnarly fingers
dislocated in this collision with Robert Horry,
Pippen provided Portland's most reliable scoring
with 22 points on just 12 shots.
And, he was a terror on defense,
recording six steals and four blocks.
That was the standout performance
in a team-wide defensive triumph.
The Blazers swarmed Shaq to force five turnovers
and make him sweat for his points.
Playing with a sprained foot,
Kobe offered no help as a bailout.
The Blazers never trailed as they took
another surprising road win.
The first time the Lakers had ever lost consecutive games
at the brand new Staples Center.
Next up was game six, in which the Blazers
would have to accomplish something
they oddly hadn't done yet this series:
beating the Lakers in Portland.
They did that, by bothering Shaq even more.
The big guy missed six straight shots
in the third quarter of game six,
and shot three of ten from the free-throw line.
Kobe played well despite the foot injury,
but Steve Smith kept pace with him,
and young Bonzi Wells had a career night off the bench,
scoring 14 fourth-quarter points.
Remarkably, the Blazers tied the series at 3-all,
and they carried that momentum into tonight.
This game had a close first half,
and in the second half, the visiting team took over.
Portland trailed by one midway through the third,
but Steve Smith kicked off a personal 7-0 run
with a gorgeous turn-around jumper over Harper.
Sheed got a couple inside buckets
off feeds from Smith and from Pippen.
That gave Portland a double-digit edge.
- [Announcer] And, just like that,
it's back to a ten-point Portland lead.
- [Narrator] Smith buried a three to make that 13.
Arvydas Sabonis found Sheed to make it 15.
Pippen's step-back three near the end of the quarter
put the Blazers up 16 points.
Staples Center went silent,
and yet, fast forward to present,
and the LA fans are on their feet,
cheering for the Lakers to put this one away.
So, what happened?
How did Portland blow this?
First, some credit for a guy not on the floor, Brian Shaw.
Shaw was actually a Blazer last season.
He played five minutes for Portland, then became one
of the many players dumped to acquire Pippen.
The 34-year-old Shaw signed on with LA this season
while Kobe was recovering from a broken hand,
and he held onto a bench guard role even after Kobe healed.
Shaw contributed some shooting in this series,
but made his biggest headlines
for leaving the bench during a game-three scuffle
and getting suspended for game four.
Shaq paid tribute to his punished teammate
during the Lakers win by squeezing into his jersey.
Anyway, Shaw was pretty quiet tonight,
until what is now looking like a pivotal shot.
This funky banked-in three cut Portland's lead to 13
at the end of the third quarter,
and, in retrospect, it feels like exactly the break
LA needed to regain some momentum.
And, Shaw kept it up with another three
early in the fourth.
But, the real meat of that rally,
the real reason the score changed so dramatically
is straight-up, grade-A brick meat.
At the worst possible time,
the Blazers went freezing cold from the field.
Smith hit nothing but rim.
Wells got his shit swatted by Kobe.
Out of a time out, up ten,
all the Blazers could muster was a contested Pippen shank.
How about Sheed?
Nope.
Sheed again?
Still no.
Long, sluggish Blazer possessions generated
a rimmed-out Bonzi three,
and another late in the clock miss from Pippen.
Just stagnat, feckless offense producing absolutely nothing
against an energetic Lakers defense,
keyed by Kobe's work on the perimeter.
Portland went almost nine full minutes without a field goal.
Over seven minutes without a point,
and with four minutes left in the game,
it was our friend Shaw off of a snappy kick-out from Shaq
hitting a three to cap a 15-0 run
and tie the game at 75-all.
Now, the Lakers lead, and here I think Blazers fans
would like me to point out something else.
Portland's center right now is Brian Grant.
A dude who's four inches and like 60 pounds
smaller than his assignment.
The Blazers starting center, aging legend,
Arvydas Sabonis is much bigger but Sabonis is on the bench.
He fouled out.
We need to talk about the officiating.
This series has involved the refs quite a bit.
The Lakers game one victory got a big boost
when official Ron Garretson gave Wallace
a second technical and ejection for staring at him too much.
- [Garretson] I asked him three times
to stop staring at me to try to intimidate me.
I'm done, he's gone.
- [Narrator] That game also featured
rampant hack-a-Shaq tactics by the Blazers.
Always a challenge for the officiating crew.
O'Neal attempted more free-throws
than the whole Portland team.
In game three, Pippen and Rick Fox
started the shoving match that led to the Shaw suspension.
Portland's ugly game-four loss
included Pippen's unnecessarily hard foul on John Salley.
The one Phil Jackson was so mad about.
Coach Dunleavy, meanwhile, left game four
irritated about how Shaq was being officiated.
Pleading with officials to call more fouls
on the Lakers' center and ease off
the ticky tack calls the other way.
That's probably related to the fact that
one of history's worst free-throw shooters
shot nine of nine from the line in that game.
Game six included Dunleavy getting into it
directly with Rick Fox.
It's just been a lot.
Basketball is best when you don't notice the refs,
but officiating has been a big story-line
throughout this series and it's not gonna stop.
Especially if the Lakers win tonight.
As we speak, LA has attempted 27 free-throws tonight
to Portland's 16.
If the Lakers were shooting so badly from the line,
this game might already be decided.
Then again, if Shaq didn't bury two free-throws
with under three minutes to play
and Kobe another pair with a minute and a half to play,
the Lakers might still be losing.
But, anyway, Dunleavy's gripes
about how Shaq gets officiated
have continued in this one.
Sabonis picked up two early iffy fouls guarding the big guy,
then Grant came in and picked up two quick ones of his own.
Kinda just standing there against the post-up
on the second one.
- [Announcer] Hard to see how that is a defensive foul.
Supposed to run away from the man?
- [Narrator] And the announcers have been harping
on the inconsistency.
- [Announcer] Except where Shaq starts backing in,
they never call that.
The disparity of one side to the other,
the consistency that every player wants
is just not there.
- [Narrator] That early foul trouble
pressed little-used youngster Jermaine O'Neal into action,
and he couldn't avoid fouling either.
Sheed's gotten mad at the refs.
Bonzi's gotten mad at the refs.
Thankfully, Dick Bavetta and company
haven't been handing out technicals.
Fouls had the potential to hamper Shaq's first half, too.
He picked up his third early-ish in the second quarter,
but Coach Jackson left him in the game,
and because Sabonis tends to hang outside,
Shaq never really came close to picking up his fourth.
And, that crazy score turnaround in this final quarter,
yes the Blazers were cold, but the whistles
were also hot during that stretch.
Pippen picked up his fourth.
Sabonis picked up his fourth, then his fifth,
much to his dismay.
Sheed couldn't believe he got called for this.
And, moments after the Blazers
finally ended their scoring drought,
they lost a very frustrated Sabonis to his sixth foul.
Then, Sheed picked up a fourth on this Kobe drive,
and got right back to complaining.
That said, Wallace has less to complain about now.
He baited Shaq into his fourth foul
less than a minute ago,
but bricked the free-throws that could have tied the game,
then watched Kobe march the other way,
and cook Pippen to build this four-point lead.
And, here we are.
Two teams with familiar start.
Two teams bolstered by parts of a bygone Bulls dynasty.
A comeback from behind 3-1 in the series
might fall short because of a comeback
from behind 15 points in this quarter.
A grumpy series filled with whistles
has stayed that way tonight, but whistles or not,
this game comes down to buckets,
and Portland ran out of those
at exactly the moment LA woke up.
And, now the Lakers look for one more.
Kobe faces the aged veteran he beat just moments ago
while Shaq rolls to the rim
without a real center to stop him.
This is it.
Welcome to a moment in history.
- [Announcer] Bryant to Shaq!
(crowd erupts)
- [Narrator] Sorry, turn the TV back on for just a moment.
Because, there were 40 seconds left,
and I don't wanna leave you hanging.
The Lakers did win,
but first there was a bit more drama.
Sheed hit a three, and the Lakers missed not one, not two,
not three, not four, not five, but six free-throws
in the final 40 seconds.
They hung on though, partly because this blatant hack
on Steve Smith wasn't called a foul.
Typical.
Okay, see ya.