Originally Posted by
SOD 21
San Antonio came into that series with the best record and also the top ranked defense in the league that year. This series was easily viewed as the real NBA championship by most people.
One of the things that helped the Lakers significantly in the series was the hot shooting of Derek Fisher from the three-point line, which I believe he made 15 of his 20 fga's in the series. But overall, it was a combination of the Spurs having injuries on the perimeter, hot shooting from Derek Fisher and Kobe Bryant simply playing superb basketball. Kobe had a tendency to play better on the road during that time and Shaq would do more domination at home, mostly because Shaq would regularly get into foul trouble on the road due to his bruising style.
It was remarkable to hear Shaq call Kobe the best player in the league during/after that series given their tumultuous history together, especially with Shaq being the MVP just the previous year.