On This Date: Worthy’s Triple-Double Lifts Lakers to 1988 Championship
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The Los Angeles Lakers secured their second straight NBA title on June 21, 1988, defeating the Detroit Pistons 108-105 in Game 7 of the NBA Finals at the Great Western Forum.
Forward James Worthy powered the victory with the first triple-double of his career, finishing with 36 points, 16 rebounds and 10 assists. His performance came one season after the Lakers had captured the 1987 championship.
Los Angeles entered the 1988 postseason as the league’s top seed after a 62-20 regular season. The path to the Finals, however, required two seven-game series, first against the Utah Jazz and then versus the Dallas Mavericks.
Detroit, led by guard Isiah Thomas, posted 54 wins for the East’s No. 2 seed and survived an elimination game against the Washington Bullets in the opening round. The Finals matchup proved equally tense: the teams split the first two contests, each by 12 points, and the Pistons later built a 3-2 edge before the Lakers forced a deciding game with a one-point win in Game 6.
In the finale, Worthy’s all-around effort received support from Magic Johnson (19 points, 14 assists) and Byron Scott (21 points). The narrow win made Los Angeles the first franchise in 20 years to claim consecutive championships and delivered the last title of the famed “Showtime” era, further solidifying the legacies of Johnson, Worthy and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
Source: Lakers Nation
