While the Los Angeles Lakers won three straight NBA championships in the early 2000s, they weren’t exactly a consistently dominant team. In fact, they danced with defeat multiple times during that run.
In the 2000 Western Conference finals, they trailed the Portland Trail Blazers by 15 points early in the fourth quarter of Game 7. They hadn’t won it all yet at that point, and it looked like they had fallen apart under pressure yet again. It took a historic and thrilling comeback to send them to the NBA Finals, where they finally triumphed.
Two years later, they trailed the Sacramento Kings two games to one in the West finals. They were down by 24 points early in the second quarter of Game 4, and despite another comeback, they found themselves down by six with less than two minutes left in the fourth quarter and by two with 11.8 seconds remaining.
Then came Robert Horry’s most famous game-winning 3-pointer at the buzzer that won the game and tied the series.
#OTD in 2002, Robert Horry stunned the Kings with this buzzer-beater in Game 4 of the WCF 🚨 pic.twitter.com/H6WfqlSRFd
— NBA TV (@NBATV) May 26, 2021
While on the “NBA Finals File” podcast, Horry made a unique request having to do with that dagger (h/t Silver Screen and Roll).
“I’ve made a lot of big shots. That shot is the only shot where you just mention it, I get goosebumps because, to me, making that shot was like the birth of one of my kids. That’s how special it is to me because I grew up a big Laker fan, I grew up a big Magic Johnson fan. To be able to knock down that shot, in Staples and have the fans chant my name, it is the greatest feeling…When I go to meet my maker, I want that video played at my funeral. It’s the best moment of my basketball career.”
After that shot, Los Angeles lost Game 5 in Sacramento, but it responded by winning Game 6 at home and a very memorable and exciting Game 7 up north, allowing it to claim its third straight world title.
The Kings and their fans cried foul, but the franchise never quite recovered, and to this day, the city still isn’t over that series.
Deal with it, Sacramento. Horry’s shot will live on longer than his physical body, or the physical bodies of the rest of us.
