subject: Los Angeles Lakers Tickets : Once A Day,lakers Has Lost All Of Their Eight Appearances In The Finals [print this page] The Los Angeles Lakers are a National Basketball Association (NBA) team based in Los Angeles, California. The Lakers play their home games at Staples Center, which they share with their fellow NBA rival, the Los Angeles Clippers, and their sister team, the Los Angeles Sparks of the WNBA.
The Lakers are the reigning NBA champions after defeating the Boston Celtics in the Finals four games to three, capturing the franchise's 16th NBA championship on the 50th anniversary of its relocation to Los Angeles. As of 2009, the Lakers are the most valuable NBA franchise. In June 2010, basketball analyst and writer John Hollinger ranked the Lakers as the greatest NBA franchise of all time.
The Lakers franchise was founded in 1946 in Detroit, Michigan before moving to Minneapolis, where the team got its official title from the state's nickname, "Land of 10,000 Lakes."[4] The Lakers won five championships before relocating to Los Angeles in the 1960/61 season.
The Lakers lost all of their eight appearances in the NBA Finals in the 1960s, despite having help from Elgin Baylor and Jerry West. In 1972, the Lakers won their sixth title, first in Los Angeles, under coach Bill Sharman.
The Lakers' popularity soared in the 1980s when they won five additional championships during a nine-year span with the leadership of Hall of Famers Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, James Worthy and coach Pat Riley, the franchise's all-time leader in regular season game wins and playoff games coached and wins. Two of those championships during that span were against their arch-rivals, the Boston Celtics.
From 2000 to 2002, the Lakers won three titles consecutively with the help of Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, and Hall of Fame coach Phil Jackson. After losing both the 2004 and 2008 NBA Finals, the Lakers captured two more championships, for a total of 16, by defeating the Orlando Magic in 2009, and the Boston Celtics in 2010.
The Lakers hold records for having (into the 2009/10 season) the most wins (3,027), the highest winning percentage (61.9%), the most NBA Finals appearances (31), the second fewest non-playoff seasons with five (San Antonio Spurs have four), and the second-most NBA championships with 16, behind the Boston Celtics' 17. They also hold the record for compiling the longest win streak (33) in U.S. professional team sports (also an NBA record) in the 1971/72 season.
Sixteen Hall of Famers have played for the Lakers, while four Hall of Famers (John Kundla, Bill Sharman, Pat Riley and Phil Jackson) have coached the team. Four Lakers (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant) have won the NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) award[8] for a total of 8 MVP awards.
The Lakers have 21 Hall of Famers (15 players, 4 head coaches, and 2 contributors) who contributed to the organization. The Hall of Fame players include (in alphabetical order): Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Elgin Baylor, Wilt Chamberlain, Gail Goodrich, Connie Hawkins, Magic Johnson, Clyde Lovellette, Karl Malone, Slater Martin, Bob McAdoo, George Mikan, Vern Mikkelsen, Jim Pollard, James Worthy and Jerry West. John Kundla coached the Lakers to five NBA titles in the 1940s and 1950s. Bill Sharman coached the Lakers to their first Los Angeles title in 1972.
Pat Riley coached the Lakers to four NBA titles in the 1980s and Phil Jackson coached the Lakers to five in the 2000s. Chick Hearn was the Lakers broadcaster for 42 seasons until his death in 2002; he was inducted to the Hall a year later. Longtime owner Jerry Buss was inducted in 2010 after owning the Lakers franchise for over 30 years.
There have been 21 head coaches for the Lakers franchise. The franchise won their first five NBA championships, from 1949 to 1954, all while coached by John Kundla. Pat Riley was the franchise's all-time leader in both regular season and playoff games coached and wins. Phil Jackson broke Riley's regular season record in 2009, and eventually the playoff wins and games coached record a year later. Jackson, Riley, Kundla, and Bill Sharman have all been inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame for their coaching careers.
George Mikan, Jim Pollard, Jerry West, Pat Riley, Magic Johnson, and Kurt Rambis have all played and head coached for the Lakers. Jackson, in his second term, has been head coach of the Lakers since the 2005/06 season.
