Lakers defeat Suns on last-second shot by Ron Artest
Posted by ashertrix , Thursday, May 27, 2010 9:00 PM
He puts back a missed jumper by Kobe Bryant to give L.A. a 103-101 win in Game 5 for a 3-2 lead in best-of-seven series. Bryant has 30 points and nine assists. Steve Nash leads Phoenix with 29 points and 11 assists.
It wasn't easy and it went down to the last second, but the Lakers took Game 5 of the Western Conference finals with a 103-101 victory over the Phoenix Suns.
In the end, it was Ron Artest's rebound and put back of a Kobe Bryant miss at the buzzer that gave the Lakers the win. For Artest it was an atonement for some bad clock management a minute earlier.
The Lakers lead the best-of-seven series 3-2 with Game 6 on Saturday in Phoenix.
Bryant was the high scorer with 30 points. Derek Fisher had 22 points and Pau Gasol added 21. Bryant led the Lakers with nine assists, while Lamar Odom had 13 rebounds.
Here's how the heart-stopping finish unfolded for the Lakers:
With about 2 1/2 minutes to play Channing Frye missed a three-pointer that could have tied the score. The Lakers rebounded and Gasol was fouled. He went to the line and hit both attempts to put the Lakers ahead by five.
But Steve Nash, who finished with 29 points and 11 assists, made a jumper on the move with less than two minutes to play. The Lakers answered as Odom scored from under the basket. Still the Suns weren't done as Nash hit another jumper with 1:21 to play.
Then Ron Artest, who rarely passes up a shot, missed a three and after Gasol got the rebound, Artest missed another three with 22 seconds left on the shot clock.
Suddenly, the Lakers were up by only three with 51.5 seconds to play. But the Lakers got lucky as Frye missed a three. But when Gasol missed a slam the Suns took two attempts at threes to tie the score before Jason Richardson banked in a 27-footer with 3.5 seconds to play.
That led to Artest's heroics.
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