J.B. Bickerstaff fondly remembers Kobe Bryant and the day he once tried to guard the NBA legend in high school
Updated Jan 26, 2021;
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On the first anniversary of Kobe Bryant s death, a look back at his games in Cleveland
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CLEVELAND, Ohio Cleveland Cavaliers head coach J.B. Bickerstaff was a teenager when he first met basketball legend Kobe Bryant at an NBA Players Association camp before their final high school season. Only Bickerstaff, who was new to the exclusive circuit that featured some of the country’s elite prep stars, had no clue it was Bryant.
“Another guy on my team a couple guys were All-Americans, McDonald’s All-Americans and on and on and we go out to match up to start the game and nobody guards Kobe,” Bickerstaff recalled Monday night in a Zoom call with reporters prior to the Cavs’ 115-108 loss to the Los Angeles Lakers. “I just walked over and was like, ‘OK, I’ve got him.’ I really had no idea who he was.”
Jordan Clarkson won’t forget the advice he received as he waited at the scorer’s table to check in for his first taste of NBA action. He’ll never forget it. His morning had started with a lesson from a legend, a shootaround with Kobe Bryant. That night, as Clarkson prepared to enter his first preseason game, Bryant approached with a few final words.
“We don’t take those [practice] shots for no reason,” Clarkson recalls Bryant saying. “Go out there and shoot ’em.”
The box score from that night shows that Bryant attempted 12 field goals.
Clarkson took 13.
“I got up eight shots in a matter of like 3 minutes,” Clarkson says with a smile. “That’s kind of been my M.O. for real since I’ve been in the league.”
Updated on January 26, 2021 at 12:10 pm
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Tony Altobelli remembers receiving the text message one year ago.
The sports information director at Orange Coast College looked at his phone and saw a message from the school’s women’s basketball coach.
There had been reports of a helicopter crash that morning in the Santa Monica Mountains northwest of Los Angeles. It appeared that Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant was onboard.
“So, I texted her and said, ‘Did you hear anything about Kobe?’ Her response was, ‘Where is your brother?’
“I completely stopped.”
Tony Altobelli, brother of John Altobelli
Tony Altobelli’s 56-year-old brother John, a beloved baseball coach at Orange County Community College known as Coach Alto, his wife Keri and 14-year-old daughter Alyssa were all on the helicopter, which was on it way to a girls basketball tournament.
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He’s been gone a year, taken along with his teenaged daughter, Gianna, and seven others friends, parents, teammates and the trusted pilot of the doomed helicopter in an instant, and far, far too soon.
In death, Kobe Bryant looms as large as he did in life. Like any transcendent star dying young, Bryant will forever be beautiful and perfect in memory, his flaws fading, the appreciation for his gifts swelling.
On the Anniversary of Kobe Bryant’s Death, Fans Remember the Lakers Legend
Black Mamba fans in Southern California and around the world are reflecting on Kobe Bryant’s life Jan. 26, the first anniversary of his death, along with the passing of his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others, in a Calabasas helicopter crash.
Bryant is survived by his wife, Vanessa, and daughters Natalia, 18; Bianka, 4; and Capri, 1.
One year later, tributes to the Los Angeles Lakers legend sprang up everywhere in the Southland, including murals on buildings and any other imaginable surfaces.
Because his loss hurt so much for Bryant fans, most of them talk first of that tragic day in recollection. Bryant and the others in the helicopter were going from Orange County to the former Lakers’ Mamba Sports Academy in Thousand Oaks for a youth basketball game, with Bryant scheduled to coach his daughter’s team.