Kobe voluntarily removes himself from a game and Swaggy P plays defense

Yet knowing that he will only make one more appearance in San Antonio before he retires, Bryant acknowledged that through the Lakers-Spurs rivalry he has a familiarity with the city, that only he can have.

Los Angeles Lakers’ Kobe Bryant (L) chats to coach Mike Brown during Game 7 of their NBA Western Conference basketball playoff series against the Denver Nuggets in Los Angeles.

“I thought towards the end of the game he started to look fairly normal again, but he obviously wasn’t himself, ” coach Gregg Popovich said. Several are for San Antonio specific events but a white shirt with a modified version of the Los Angeles Lakers’ logo screenprinted on the front stands out.

“I’m not anxious about that”, Bryant said. “‘Sometimes we came out on top, sometimes the Lakers did”.

It was a loss, like everything else this season, 123-122 in overtime to the Minnesota Timberwolves, but D’Angelo Russell had 23 points and Julius Randle had 20 points and 12 rebounds two days after they lost their starting jobs.

Flying in and out of the rotation lately, Nick Young received 29 minutes off the bench and finished off the game, adding 13 points on 5 of 9 shooting.

“They have forced us to be our absolute best whenever we played against them”, he said.

Kobe Bryant is having by far his worst year since entering the league. “We have had had some epic battles”.

After exchanging leads eight times throughout the night and playing through overtime, it was finally a stop by Minnesota that snapped a four-game losing streak for the home team. It’s all in the path now as Howard is with the Rockets and Bryant is ending his career this season.

(STATISTICAL) LINE OF THE NIGHT – See Bryant. Russell and Randle each played the rest of the game and nearly helped the Lakers beat the T-Wolves in overtime.

“It felt good to see all those jerseys in the crowd”, Bryant said. “That’s very rare to have that here in San Antonio”. “They’re probably going to fall on their face a bunch more times, but at the end of the day, they’ll at least be put in that position where they can grow”. The Spurs responded by finishing the quarter with 12 straight points, highlighted by two Mills’ 3-pointers and a back-door layup from Manu Ginobili courtesy of a pass from Boris Diaw. The Spurs outscored the Lakers 14-2 to close the first quarter, capped by consecutive 3-pointers from Patty Mills.

The Lakers held the advantage for a handful of seconds, but Shabazz Muhammad got on the board and answered with a three-point bucket to steal it back. Coach Byron Scott said he does not think Clarkson will be ready to play at Houston on Saturday….

As reported by NBA.com, it was arguably Kobe’s most efficient game this season; however, the five-time champion did not play at the last period as they were already down by 21 in their 126-97 loss to the Rockets.

Whatever issues that both had in the past, it seems Kobe Bryant and Dwight Howard see it all as part of their competitive nature that never really became personal.

Yet even those faithful Wolves fans who aren’t Bryant’s biggest supporters showed a little admiration Wednesday.

“Those were things I didn’t have to do in the past, but I surely have to do now”, he said. “Words can’t describe the respect I have for him. Every chance I get, I always sit next to him and bend his ear”.