More tributes for Bryant, grieving Lakers return to training
LOS ANGELES: The Los Angeles Lakers, reeling from the death of team icon Kobe Bryant, “want to represent what Kobe was about” as they press ahead with the NBA season, coach Frank Vogel said on Wednesday.
“We want to represent what Kobe was about more than anything,” Vogel said. “We’ve always wanted to make him proud, and that’s not going to be any different here.”
Vogel, 46, spoke to reporters at the team’s practice facility, where star players including LeBron James and Anthony Davis turned out but did not meet with the media.
Vogel said the club had a simple directive for players still coming to terms with Bryant’s death in a helicopter crash on Sunday: “You guys can speak when you’re ready, and not before.”
But the timetable for returning to NBA action is set, with the Lakers to host the Portland Trail Blazers at Staples Center arena tomorrow (Saturday, Thai time).
That is less than a week since Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven other people were killed when the Sikorsky S-76 helicopter slammed into a rugged hillside in thick fog in Calabasas, northwest of Los Angeles.
The chopper was headed to Bryant’s Mamba Sports Academy in Thousand
Oaks, where his daughter was set to play a basketball game.
When the team convened on Tuesday, Vogel said, they “did some things that we thought would be therapeutically beneficial.
“We got in the gym for some team shooting work, no real practice working on anything in particular. I wanted our guys to come in mentally free but to get a sweat, touch the ball and be around each other.
“Then we had a lunch where we all just spent time together and grieved together.”
Meanwhile, Vanessa Bryant broke her silence on Wednesday, saying she is “devastated” and struggling to imagine life without her husband and daughter.
“We are completely devastated by the sudden loss of my adoring husband, Kobe — the amazing father of our children; and my beautiful, sweet Gianna,” she wrote in an Instagram post.
She said they are fighting to keep going and take comfort in the memories of the life they had together.
“Kobe, and our baby girl, Gigi, are shining on us to light the way. Our love for them is endless — and that’s to say, immeasurable.
“I just wish I could hug them, kiss them and bless them. Have them here with us, forever.”