Los Angeles Lakers - 2010 Western Conference Championship Trophy Presentation

Let's go with Craig Sager Craig, well, having 37 points was your last field goal on a closely contested double team that sealed the victory. You walked up to Alvin Gentry and told him what you think that he opened his arms and slid into the NBA. In the finals all night we've been describing how brilliant your play was, but in your words, how do you think you played down the stretch? Yes, I did pretty well. You know, I missed a couple of easy plays early on, midway through the fourth quarter. but I was able to pull myself together and hit some big shots.

Alvin enjoyed this moment, he enjoyed the series throughout the playoffs, he came up to you a second ago and said: Kobe, that was great defense, how did you do well? a little high separation, bring it down now you're going to play the Boston Celtics two years ago that team pushed them, they're very physical with you, how is this team more equipped to handle that tough Boston defense? Well we'll see. You know, we'll see how much we mature. You know they challenged us extremely well in the finals a couple of years ago. You know it's now on trial to see how much we've grown.

This looked like an easy win at the start of the quarter. fourth until Sasha Buic's flagrant foul seemed to ignite the Suns and their fans as the leader of this team. What was your reaction to that incident? I was going to kill him, what do you say to him now? I'm still going to kill him, well, brother. game, don't do it before the finals, just kidding of course, very good, back to you Mar, we welcome you back to Phoenix, Arizona where it's time to participate in the NBA presented by Hyundai and right here we will send it to Ernie Johnson who is with the Western Conference champion Los Angeles Lakers Ernie yes, thank you very much Marv here with the champions and here is Phil Jackson polishing the

trophy

while we talk about the cup Mitch, the general manager is here too and a Laker legend, Michael Cooper, is here to do the honors by presenting this

trophy

to the Western Conference Champions, Coop, first of all, Ernie, we would like to congratulate the Phoenix Suns and the organization for having a fabulous run in the playoffs and to the Lakers for the third consecutive year, to coach Jackson, to his coaching staff. uh, for winning the Western Conference Championship and Boston, you want us here, come on, Mitch, what are the qualities that this team has to reach the finals for the third year in a row?

Well, certainly experience, you know, is number one, we have a team that has been together generally for a long time as a group and they know what it takes to get here and we weathered a great comeback today, you know, by a wonderful team who really deserves to be here, my congratulations to Bob Saber, Steve Kerr and of course, Alvin Jentry, you have a great team, you deserve to do well and congratulations to you too and your coach Phil Jackson. This was never in a really comfortable series. Did it go well with a three-point shooting team like Phoenix?

You really know that any lead is impossible, you can't sit on anything and as they showed we had an 18 point lead they are right behind the game in the next few minutes. You know, we talked about a rematch from 2008 here in the memo. It hasn't been very good since the last time you saw this team in a playoff series, which holds up well. I think we remember more any situation of losing on our home court, which, you know, we had some defensive lapses and they took advantage of it. and they beat us on our home court this year, we have the advantage of playing at home, we look forward to these playoffs with great intensity.

I can only imagine, thank you very much and congratulations, coach and co- Captain Derrick Fischer is here, um, what is said on the court. After a game like this, after a series like this, player to player between the Lakers and the Suns, just congratulations on a great season, you know, sports, someone has to win, someone is going to lose and they gave a great fight, we played against a great team and you know we deserve the advancement basically the same along the same lines that I asked the coach as a guy who was on the court in that series and the last time you saw him it was a uh, it was an ugly . margin um, what stuck with you, um, what we can say on camera, yeah, I agree with what my coach said, uh, you know, losing that game on our home court, you know, we feel like it was really a turning point and at the same time, For now we're not going to rest on the fact that we have Advantage corn at home, uh, but we're looking forward to this starting Thursday night and then I'll get the answer off camera on one moment.

This is the Western

conference

.

2010

champions, Los Angeles Lakers, we will send it back tomorrow. Very good, thanks Ernie and Dougas.