Anthony Davis' game-winner for the Lakers against the Denver Nuggets was a "Mamba shot," head coach Frank Vogel said.
Davis delivered an incredible buzzer-beating three to lift the Lakers to a 105-103 victory over the Nuggets on Sunday as they moved into a 2-0 lead in the Western Conference finals.
Vogel said the Lakers wanted to honor the late Kobe Bryant, the NBA great who died in a helicopter crash in January. And the Lakers coach believes Davis' game-winner was the type of shot five-time NBA champion and former MVP Bryant would have produced.
"Well, we want to embody what Kobe Bryant stood for and honor his memory," he told reporters. "Obviously, there are certain games where we are going to feel it a little bit more than others. When we have that uniform on, I think we feel it more than others.
"That's a shot Kobe Bryant would hit. To me, AD coming off just flying to the wing like that, catch-and-shoot with the biggest game on the line of our season, nothing but net, it's a Mamba shot."
AD lines up and KNOCKS DOWN the triple to WIN Game 2 of the WESTERN CONFERENCE FINALS! #TissotBuzzerBeater#ThisIsYourTime pic.twitter.com/azdLowx8aK
— NBA (@NBA) September 21, 2020
While the Nuggets rallied in Game 2, Davis (31 points and nine rebounds) and LeBron James (26 points and 11 rebounds) led the Lakers to victory.
Vogel was full of praise for Davis and James as the Lakers close in on a first NBA Finals appearance since 2010.
"I keep saying, he [Davis] is a big-time player. He really carried us through a stretch where we were struggling to score late in the third," Vogel said. "The combo of LeBron James and Anthony Davis is just – if one of them is not going, the other one is. There was a little bit of that tonight.
"When they're both going at the same time, we're near impossible to stop. Those guys both carried each other throughout the game and obviously a big part of the win."