When the Game Was Ours (24 page)

"I felt there was some envy between the two of us. But I took it with a grain of salt.

"I just didn't spend time with him. I respected his game and left it at that."

Although both paid each other the proper homage publicly, there was little interaction between Johnson and Jordan outside of the game. Their differences were exaggerated by the silence between them. Although Michael and Magic evolved into two of the game's biggest icons, their "relationship" lacked any genuine substance.

"We never got a chance to talk about it," Magic said. "It was Magic against Michael. That's why we never became friends. It's too bad we never spent any time together. People ask me all the time why I didn't do more projects with Michael. I don't even know what to tell them. It [the freeze-out] was a misunderstanding, and neither one of us ever reached out and tried to smooth things over. So the next thing you know, the years go by and there's this distance between us, and it all could have been avoided if either one of us just made the first move. But we didn't.

"That was a big reason why, even today, Michael and I don't know each other as well as we should."

Although Jordan captivated a new generation of NBA fans, his Chicago team was not yet ready for prime time in 1985. The Bulls were eliminated by the Milwaukee Bucks in the opening round of the playoffs, and Boston and Los Angeles appeared headed for another collision in the Finals.

Boston rolled over Cleveland, Detroit, and Philadelphia (whose window of opportunity finally closed as Julius Erving approached retirement), while Los Angeles blew past Phoenix, Portland, and Denver.

Kareem remained LA's primary offensive weapon, but Magic, driven by echoes of "Tragic" (which the Boston fans delighted in chanting during his lone visit to the Garden during the regular season) and "Fakers," tried to post his own Career Best Effort every night. When he was tired or worn down by the travel, all Magic had to do was close his eyes and visualize the celebration in the streets after the Celtics clinched the title.

The Lakers liked their odds. They were quicker and deeper than Boston, which often shortened its rotation to seven players. Kup-chak and veteran Bob McAdoo supplied the muscle that had been missing the previous year, and Riley painstakingly prepared each of them for their chance at redemption.

When it became clear the Lakers would be playing the Celtics in the Finals, Riley called ahead to the Boston hotel that would be hosting them and made it clear that he did not expect to see Celtics banners hanging in the lobby or employees wearing shamrock shirts checking them in. He made sure his players checked in under assumed names and told them to take the phone off the hook when they went to bed to prevent any crank calls in the middle of the night.

All year long Riley harped on treating each possession like it was a rare jewel, even during 25-point blowouts. Magic adopted that philosophy, and the byproduct was a more patient and diligent point guard. As Johnson warmed up before Game 1 in Boston Garden, the site of his lowest moment as a pro, he turned to Cooper and quietly announced, "It's Showtime."

The debacle that followed was equally stunning and inexplicable. Boston mugged LA 148–114 on a night when everything went right for the Celtics, including Scott Wedman's perfect 11-of-11 shooting from the floor. Kareem appeared weary and sluggish and was repeatedly beaten down the court by Parish. Within hours, the obituaries for the Lakers captain and his team were distributed. The beating was forever dubbed the Memorial Day Massacre.

Riley was flabbergasted by his team's meltdown. For 11 months he had harped on the pride of the Lakers franchise and the indignities they had suffered at the hands of the Celtics. He cursed the arrogance of Auerbach, the irreverence of Maxwell, and the swagger of Bird on a daily basis, systematically constructing a hatred for the Boston franchise that he fervently believed would withstand any challenge.

He had pushed his Lakers team to the brink, from the no-lay-up rule to the Career Best Effort campaign to hours and hours of film on the Celtics and their tendencies.

And the best his center could do in response was 12 points and 3 rebounds? Magic had scored 19 points with 12 assists, but he had come away with only 1 rebound, thereby limiting the Lakers' transition chances.

"You call yourself a fucking Hall of Famer?" Riley challenged Ka-reem afterward. "That guy kicked your ass. Parish embarrassed the hell out of you. Look at this pathetic stat line. Three rebounds? Three rebounds for a Hall of Famer?"

"And you," he said, turning to Magic. "You're supposed to be one of the best players in this league. You got dominated today. Fucking dominated. One rebound? You think that's going to get it done against this team, against your boy Larry?

"Where's the fucking leadership? This is supposed to be your team!"

Riley then turned his wrath toward Worthy, who had missed 11 of his 19 shots, but by then Magic had stopped listening. He was still smarting from his coach's assault on his game.

"He got me with the leadership thing," Johnson said. "That hurt. But I didn't say anything. When Pat got into his little zone, if you knew what was good for you, then you just sat there and took it."

As his coach railed on about their lack of concentration and professionalism and heart, Magic started recalling their final practice before Game 1. The Lakers had been loose, confident. They played H-O-R-S-E, took wild shots from half-court, had a few laughs. In retrospect, they had lacked the proper focus and purpose.

"We paid the price for that," Magic said.

The next morning, humiliated by his poor showing and portrayed in the Boston papers as an old man whose time had passed, the 38-year-old Abdul-Jabbar vacated his customary seat in the back row of Riley's film sessions and sat in the front.

Riley treated his players to a three-hour horror film. The Lakers relived their Game 1 mistakes in slow motion with profane prose accompanying each error. As they watched Wedman sink shot after shot, their coach became enraged all over again. "Who the fuck is Scott Wedman?" Riley screamed. "This guy can only shoot when he's open. And we left him open all damn night!"

Kareem apologized for his play and promised a different outcome in Game 2. As the Lakers walked out to the practice floor, Ri-ley announced, "Today there will be no fouls. I don't want to hear shit in this gym. I better not hear any complaining. You got me?"

Silence.

The practice was a free-for-all. The forwards knocked each other to the floor. Cooper manhandled Magic, holding him and bumping him and chopping his arms. "That's a foul," Magic moaned. "Get off me."

"Quit crying," Cooper snapped. "I'm doing exactly what D.J. is going to do to you tomorrow night."

When Riley finally ended the workout, the players dropped the balls, walked to the bus without speaking, then scattered to their hotel rooms. It was the first time Magic could remember not making plans for supper with Cooper and Byron Scott. The trio had become inseparable, dubbing themselves "the Three Musketeers," yet on this night the swashbucklers had gone solo.

Magic padded around his hotel room. One hour passed, then another. Finally, he placed two phone calls. "Coop, Byron," he said. "We can't do this. Let's grab something to eat."

They spent a solemn evening analyzing Riley's criticisms. The coach didn't care if they united against him as long as they were united, yet his biting words had troubled Magic. Riley was no longer a hesitant assistant thrust into the driver's seat. He was in charge, demanding accountability, and Magic knew he needed to deliver.

In a quiet moment before Game 2, Riley pulled Johnson aside. "You need to control the tempo of this game," he said. "It's paramount that we establish early that we've come to play. That's up to you."

Magic nodded. The Lakers had made some mild adjustments defensively; he now had the assignment of guarding Danny Ainge to start the game, with the expectation he would drop down and double-team Boston's front line when needed.

On the other end, his job description was the same: find the big fella in the post and create fast-break opportunities.

The first few minutes of Game 2, Magic knew, were critical. So, on the opening possession, Magic dropped the ball into Kareem in the post. He set his team in motion after a Boston miss, driving through the paint, waiting for the inevitable crowd of defenders to gravitate toward him, then dishing off to a wide-open Kurt Rambis underneath for a lay-up. The next time, on a textbook 3-on-2 fast break, he found Worthy on the wing and set him up for a transition jam.

After his team crafted an early 13–6 lead, Magic was on the move again, ambling up the floor on another 3-on-2 fast break. His instinct was always to pass, but as he penetrated the key, he saw number 33 in a white jersey coming over to help. Johnson couldn't resist. Instead of dishing off, he went right at Larry Bird, knocking in the lay-up over his rival's outstretched arms.

"Now that's what I'm talkin' about!" exulted Magic when the Celtics called time-out.

Once safely ensconced in his huddle, Magic clapped his hands and encouraged his guys, "Let's go now! Let's go for the kill!"

The Lakers' primary weapon of choice was Abdul-Jabbar, who was reborn in Game 2, scoring 30 points, grabbing 17 rebounds, dishing off 8 assists, and blocking 3 shots so the Lakers could wrestle the home-court advantage away from the Celtics.

Bird, who had been battling a balky elbow, scored 30 points but shot 9 of 21 from the floor. As LA walked off with the victory, Larry told D.J., "We're screwed if we don't start shooting better."

When Bird's aim (8 of 21) did not improve in Game 3 and LA thrashed Boston 136–111 at the Forum, speculation centered on whether it was Michael Cooper's redoubtable defense or Bird's sore elbow that hampered the forward.

"Mostly Cooper," Bird said. "But truthfully, a little of both."

Bird's elbow had been nagging him since the end of March. He had it drained, even looked into having surgery at one point, but when the doctors explained it was a sensitive area and there was risk of permanent nerve damage if they operated, Bird decided to play through it. He spent the tail end of the regular season coming off the bench in a few games to economize his minutes, but the elbow often locked up without warning. He missed a playoff game against Cleveland that spring when he woke up and was unable to bend his arm. After some physical therapy, it would eventually loosen up, but that was a temporary fix that could fail him at any time.

"Most days I couldn't extend my elbow its full length," Bird explained. "Once the game started, I didn't think that much about it, but it was hard to get the proper rotation and height on my shot. No question, I was struggling."

Cooper added to his woes by bodying up to him whenever he received the ball and taking away his lanes to the basket. Bird was able to drive past most other defenders, but Cooper's quickness and his deceptive strength prevented Bird from enjoying his usual spacing. "I knew when he was on me to make every open shot count, because there weren't going to be many," Bird said.

Bird wasn't the only Celtic out of sync. Parish's play was up and down. The bench wasn't deep, and the Boston starters had logged too many minutes. When Boston called a team meeting, half the guys mistakenly went to the Forum and the other half met at the team hotel.

A Dennis Johnson jumper at the buzzer knotted the series 2–2 in Game 4, but Abdul-Jabbar answered again in Game 5 with 36 points and another Lakers victory. As the action shifted back to Boston with LA ahead 3–2, the Lakers were poised to win a title in the same city where their dreams had been annihilated a year before.

The aura of Auerbach's cigars, the booby-trapped parquet, and the plethora of championship banners was not quite so daunting the second time around. Riley ordered high-powered fans to cool off the locker room in case another heat wave settled into the visitors' area.

"The Celtics mystique definitely bothered us in 1984," said Worthy, "but by 1985 it was old news."

In Game 6, the Celtics shortened their rotation further. Riley instructed Magic, "Run them off the floor." Johnson pushed tempo and fed Kareem for 29 points, but also sprinkled in some key baskets of his own. He managed the game so thoroughly that it appeared as though he could score at any time but chose to only when absolutely necessary. Magic checked out with a triple-double—14 points, 14 assists, and 10 rebounds—and the Lakers posted a Career Best Effort against the team that had tormented their franchise for decades. They had done something no other team in history had accomplished: clinched an NBA championship on the Garden floor.

While Abdul-Jabbar fittingly was awarded the Finals MVP trophy, Riley grabbed his point guard and whispered in his ear, "We couldn't have won this without you."

"Magic's purpose was written all over his face in Game 6," Riley said. "It was, 'Atone for 1984.' It was life or death for him."

Bird scuffed his way through another poor shooting night (12 for 29), which left him shooting 44.9 percent for the series. As he headed to his locker room, Bird noted that the normally frenzied Celtics fans were silent, numb with shock. He felt the same way.

For Riley, whose career had been marred by a series of crushing losses to the Celtics, the championship was a dream fulfilled. For Jerry West, who watched from his living room in California, shouting instructions at his television set, it was payback—finally.

And for Earvin Johnson, who reversed his fortunes from Tragic back to Magic, it was redemption of the sweetest kind. He celebrated the win over the Celtics in the name of West and Chamberlain and Baylor and every other Lakers loyalist who had wondered if this day would ever come.

He gently corralled Kareem court-side, a far less demonstrative hug than when he leaped into his arms five years earlier as a rookie, yet far more heartfelt. This time the embrace truly meant something.

In the cluttered visitors' locker room, the Lakers gathered in a circle and chanted "LA! LA!" in unison. Their owner, Jerry Buss, accepted the championship trophy from David Stern and declared, "This has removed the most odious sentence in the Engl ish language. It can never again be said the Lakers have not beaten the Celtics."