New Orleans had pulled within 95-92 when Bryant nailed a three-pointer with just under a minute left to make it 98-92.
Advertisement
Each time his shot fell, the Pelicans’ home crowd erupted in cheers. It becomes: ‘Maybe this is what happens (when you’re older). However, out of a timeout Jrue Holiday air balled a 3-pointer that would have forced overtime. The Pelicans superstar made an assortment of shots on his way to posting 17 of his game-high 39 points in the quarter. It wasnt enough to get the job done tonight..
“I knew the amount of training that I had put in over the summertime”.
Kobe Bryant led the Lakers (11-41) with 27 points and, as in the win over Minnesota on Tuesday, his 3-pointers in the fourth quarters lifted them to the victory.
“He did what Kobe Bryant does”. He loves that. Seeing him hit that big three and hit free throws down the stretch, that’s what it’s all about. “He’s just on a nice little roll”.
This marked his first game in New Orleans since last season, the night he tore his rotator cuff and played the fourth quarter left-handed.
But once Bryant went to the bench at the 3:50 mark New Orleans rallied, outscoring L.A. 16-2 to take a 28-26 lead at the end of the first. It’s a home game and we lose for all the wrong reasons.
Davis had a chance to cut the lead to five with 3:03 to play, but he missed a breakway dunk attempt, appearing to lose control of the ball on the way to the rim.
Bryant said he doesn’t know where the fountain of youth has come from in the last week. I mean, I refuse to play basketball with anyone over six feet tall just to avoid that risk. It’s hard – 20 years and all these injuries. You put all the work in and still there’s nothing to show for it and you can’t do anything about it.’ And I had to be really stubborn and say, ‘No. “Right now it feels like I have some consistency to my legs”. In Thursday’s win over the Pelicans, Bryant finished with 27 points and 12 rebounds in 32 minutes, and he’s now amassed 65 points over his last two contests.
New Orleans head coach Alvin Gentry was extremely disappointed in his team’s effort.
“I wasn’t going to quit”, Bryant added.
Advertisement
“Our young guys are still so young they don’t understand when you’ve got a double-digit lead you can’t relax”, Scott said. “Now we’ve been taking steps backward and we can’t allow ourselves to do that if we wanna be able to achieve our goals”.
