LAKERS SCRAPE GAME 2 WIN

 

(Image taken from NBA.com)

The 2009 NBA Finals were underway, with the Lakers facing the Magic with the championship trophy on the line. The interesting thing about Game 1 in LA was that the Magic did indeed decide to gamble on giving minutes to Jameer Nelson. Not that it did them much good, the Magic found themselves deepfried to the tune of 100-75. The teams stayed in LA in Game 2 though my initial impressioon was that after Game 1, the Magic would be better off writing this one off and wait till the series switched to Orlando for Game 3. The Lakers still had to be on their guard though. If the Magic could somehow win Game 2, it would turn the series on it's head.

Well the Magic opened the scoring, the Lakers countered with a three pointer, and that was pretty much it for the first few minutes of the game. The two sides went on to duel for the lead and the US commentators said that both teams had "a lot of energy". They didn't score a lot of points though. The Lakers went on to lead 10-6 but that was with only 5:10 left in the first quarter. The Magic were able to come back from that to tie the game. The Magic then went on to lead 15-13 with 1:29 on the clock but a Laker jumper meant that the game was tied at 15 at the first buzzer. Lamar Odom led the Lakers with 5 points while Dwight Howard led the Magic with 4.

The 2nd quarter started a bit livlier with the Lakers managing to pick up an edge. They went on to hold the Magic in a drought for the best part of two minutes, though the road team again recovered to come back and tie the game at 26 with 6:23 left in the half. The Lakers replied by holding the Magic in a two minute drought and Stan van Gundy wasn't too happy that his team were getting smothered so easilly, the Magic were pointing at Lakers players rather than defending them! The result was that the Lakers led 40-35 at half time. Pau Gasol led the way on 7 points. Now the Magic had to avoid being killed off in the third quarter again.

Well the Eastern conference champions went the right way about it. The Lakers led 42-37 with 11:18 left in the third but the Magic replied with a 6-0 run to turn the game round. The two sides went on to duel for the lead but the Lakers did seem to have a slight edge still. The Magic were improving though, got their act together defensively and in a fairly low scoring period mid-quarter, retook the lead though the Lakers came back to tie the game with the clock running down. The duel continued for the rest of the quarter and was won when Hedo Turkoglu hit a jumper, giving him 17 points and the Magic a 65-63 lead going into the final quarter.

It didn't take long for the Lakers to tie the game though and the two sides duelled for the lead, the Lakers taking the first edge. That led to a drought over over a minute before the Magic replied but the Lakers still held on toretake the edge before the Magic turned the game back around. The Lakers tied the game again but the Magic kept coming back, retaking the lead once again but the Lakers weren't done yet either. With 2:40 on the clock, they led 84-81. The Magic came back and led 88-86 with 47 seconds left. The Lakers then tied the game and after some insanity involving a windback, the quarter finished tied at 88. Kobe Bryant led the Lakers with 27 points. Rashard Lewis led the Magic on 31.

The first minute and a bit of overtime - nothing much happened. Finally though the Lakers opened the scoring with a couple of free throws before the Magic turned the game around to lead 91-90 with 3:20 on the clock. That was as good as it got for the Magic. The Lakers finally managed to shut down their opponents by holding them scoreless well over two minutes and in a five minute overtime period, that's pretty much lethal. The Magic did manage to score again but the Lakers went on to win 101-96. Kobe led the scoring with 29 points. Gasol backed him up with 24 points, Odom provided further backup from the bench with 19 and Derek Fisher also hit double figures with 12.

And now we head for Orlando.

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