Some NBA fans love to minimize the legitimacy of the Los Angeles Lakers’ most recent championship in 2020. The 2020 NBA Playoffs were held in the Orlando, Fla. bubble, and fans weren’t allowed to pack the stands at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic was causing havoc.
Still, Frank Vogel — who was the head coach of that championship team — thinks the Lakers were going to win that title regardless of whether that year’s playoffs were held in a bubble or not.
“I don’t really subscribe to the fact that teams that lost get to just say, ‘We didn’t want to be there,’” Vogel said, per The Athletic. “And the thing that sticks out to be, for all the people that want to asterisk this thing, we were the number one team from day one. We entered the bubble as the number one team in the league, the number one seed. We were gonna win that thing, whether it was in the bubble or whether it was in Staples Center. We were winning that thing. We had that belief.
“And we had to go through obstacles and delays, and go into the world’s first biosphere, to get through it. But we were gonna win that no matter what.”
For what it’s worth, Vogel’s assertion that the Lakers headed into the bubble as the top team in the league isn’t entirely accurate. While it’s true they were the No. 1 team in the Western Conference, the Milwaukee Bucks over in the Eastern Conference had the top record in the NBA before the restart.
However, the Bucks failed to represent their conference in the 2020 NBA Finals or even advance past the second round for that matter. It’s an interesting thought exercise to wonder if they would have advanced farther than they did had home-court advantage been at play, though people will never get a definitive answer.
For as much as folks like to downplay the Lakers’ title that year by pointing out that teams lacked home-court advantage, it’s important to note that L.A. didn’t have that luxury either, and yet the squad still ran roughshod over its competition.
Los Angeles wrapped up three of its four playoff series in five games, under all of the same unique circumstances as the rest of the playoff teams. Even the series against the Miami Heat might not have been as close as the results indicate. Miami took Los Angeles to six games, but the latter had a 3-1 series lead at one point and was in command for the whole series.
Leading the Lakers to a championship in 2020 was probably the zenith of Vogel’s coaching career in the NBA, but he’s now looking to win another title as an assistant coach in 2026. He’s a member of Jason Kidd’s staff on the Dallas Mavericks.