With Kobe Bryant playing strong, the Los Angeles Lakers crushed the
Orlando Magic in game one of the 2009 NBA Finals. (NBA.com)

This post originally appeared on Kevin Patra's website thesportsunion.com

Kobe Bryant led the Los Angeles Lakers to a 100-75 romp over the Orlando Magic in Game 1 of the NBA Finals Thursday night at the Staples Center.

Bryant often claims that when he is feeling it he doesn't even notice his defender.  Tonight he must have thought he was alone on the floor.  Bryant scored 40 spectacular points along with 8 assists and 8 rebounds.

The Magic tried to distract "Black Mamba" any way they could: Bumps, high fives on his shot, double teams and even taking his legs out on one jump shot.  Nothing worked against the former NBA MVP.

Bryant looked determined to erase the memory of his last two NBA Finals -- a 2004 series loss to the Detroit Pistons and last year's failure against the Boston Celtics.  The difference is already evident since the Lakers dropped Game 1 in both of those series.

The Lakers defense was a question mark coming into the series, but managed to hold off the Magic.  Taking a team that averages more than 100 points per game and bringing it down to  31 percent shooting and 31 percent behind the 3-point line was an impressive feat. 

While Bryant and the Lakers had their game-face on at both ends of the court, the Magic seemed overwhelmed by the circumstances.  Not necessarily suffering from the ever-dangerous 'just-happy-to-be-here syndrome,' Orlando looked lost.  They could not get going offensively and missed several wide-open three pointers, which is usually their bread and butter.  They also had no answer to the Laker's machine-like defense. 

Aiding Bryant in the blowout was Pau Gasol, with 16 points and 8 rebounds, and Lamar Odom, who put down the candy long enough to score 11 points and pull down 14 rebounds.  Andrew Bynum also held his own with 9 points and 9 rebounds. Bynum played particularly well against Orlando's All-Star center Dwight Howard, scoring eight of the Laker's first 14 points.  However, he quickly got into foul trouble in the first half, which led to limited minutes before the game was out of reach.

Howard led Orlando with 12 points and 15 rebounds, although he never quite seemed comfortable and struggled with numerous fouls.  It was wholly evident that Howard would not have as easy a time against the length of the Lakers as he did against Cleveland's big men. Hedo Turkoglu added 13 points. The big story from the Orland bench was the return of point guard Jameer Nelson who had surgery Feb. 19 on an injured shoulder.  Nelson provided a spark early in the second quarter and finished with 6 points and 4 assists in 23 minutes of play, but it was a spark that never started a fire. 

The Magic never seemed settled, especially in the offensive zone.  Their passes were just a little off the mark and their shooting was sometimes a little off and sometimes a lot off.  Historically jump shooting teams struggle more with time off.  After defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers on Saturday, the Magic had four days between games. This is a big difference from the two days they had between beating the Boston Celtics in Game 7 of the second round and starting the Eastern Conference Finals.

The Magic, however, are no strangers to being behind in the playoffs.  They were down 0-1 and 1-2 to the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round and 2-3 to the Celtics in the second before coming back to win both series. 

"It's a long series," Magic coach Stan Van Gundy reminded his team during a fourth quarter timeout. 

However, if Bryant continues to play with the determination he showed in Game 1, it might not be that long after all.