'Never fear, Magic is here': On May 16, 1980, with The Cap sidelined with an ankle injury, Magic Johnson launched a decade of Lakers 'Showtime' dominance. Column by LZGranderson:
“He didn’t want a bunch of people to go there to watch us lose,” she said. “We were thinking about Game 7 back at the Forum.“Knowing what we know now, of course I would have gone. But Kareem was injured and not going to play and we knew they had a great team… Who knew Magic was going to do what he did?”“When I got to the airport, I could see all the guys and their heads were down,” Johnson told me last month.
To fully grasp how unexpected his 42-point, 15-rebound, seven-assist performance was in Game 6, there are a few things you need to remember.First, Johnson was not a scorer; he averaged a shade under 18 points a game his rookie year, with a high of 31. Second, he was not the league’s best rookie. That was his rival Larry Bird, who not only won Rookie of the Year but was also named to the All-NBA first team while Magic settled for first-team All-Rookie.
Abdul-Jabbar’s injury forced the Lakers to play small ball in Game 6. Not 2020 small ball, with its reliance on the three— the Lakers were 0-2 from downtown — but by ramping up the pace. Not only did the speed of play negate the 76ers size advantage inside, it left Philadelphia scrambling defensively, especially in the second half when the Lakers outscored the 76ers by 16, and 20 at the foul line.
“I remember walking the hallway of the Spectrum and all of the bright lights on the Lakers and Magic’s big smile all over the place and we were just dejected,” he said. “We thought we had a shot.‘I said ‘Can you play center’ and said said ‘yeah, I can play center, played some center in high school’“It was relatively quiet in the locker room afterwards. No one said a lot … that was the game for us to win. We were at home, we had a chance to make some things happen.
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