Julius Randle had just scored 31 points, his career-high in the playoffs.
He was a game removed from his first postseason triple-double.
After his team’s Game 4 win over the Golden State Warriors on Tuesday night, Randle was asked about how he’s been able to finally shake his reputation as a player who fades during the playoffs. Much of the credit, Randle said, belongs to someone he last played with nine years ago: Lakers legend Kobe Bryant.
“I’ve battled through a lot in my career, to be honest. I mean, my first game in my career I broke my leg. I’ve been through a lot,” Randle said. “I had a great mentor in Kobe that didn’t necessarily let me pout or get down on myself. His thing was always, ‘All right, what’s next? How can you get better? How can you improve?’ So I always just kind of took that mentality with me.”
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Randle — who also credited his mother, Carolyn Kyles, for raising him “to be a hard worker and not feel sorry for myself” — has spoken before about Bryant’s influence on him. The Lakers selected him at No. 7 overall in the 2014 draft, and he spent four seasons in Los Angeles, with the first two the final seasons of Bryant’s Hall of Fame career.
In an essay published by The Players’ Tribune in 2021, Randle recounted a life-changing encounter with Bryant early in the 2015-16 season. The Lakers had just arrived in Randle’s hometown of Dallas late at night, with a day off before a game against the Mavericks.
Just before arriving at the hotel, Randle said, Bryant asked him what his plans were for the rest of the night. Randle responded that he was going to “have a night” with some family and friends.
“And Kobe, he just cuts me off,” Randle wrote. “He’s like, ‘Nah. We’re going to the gym.'”
And that’s exactly what they did.
“I mean, that right there, it’s just the power of Kobe,” he wrote. “If anyone else in the world had said that to me, in that moment, I might have hit ’em with an eye roll and went on with my business. But when Mamba is telling you that it’s a change of plans, and you’re coming with him to the gym tonight? You don’t ask questions. You just do as you’re told. …
“It was him trying to use the situation to teach me a lesson. The lesson being: To get to the next level in this league, you can’t be putting in that next level of work only some of the time. Has to be all of the time. No such thing as sacrifice without sacrifice.”
Bryant died in a helicopter crash on Jan. 26, 2020. About a month later, Randle had arranged for a Detroit gym to be open for his now-routine, Mamba-inspired late-night workout. When he got there, Randle wrote, the man who opened the doors for him said: “It’s good to see you. Guys don’t really show up here to work out anymore. Matter of fact, the last guy to come in this late to shoot — man, that must have been years ago. It was Kobe.”
Randle said just hearing Bryant’s name in that moment “gave me chills.”
“It was just one of those moments,” Randle wrote. “One of those moments that stays with you. One of those moments that forces you to take a second, and feel humble about how connected everything is.”
Randle was a three-time All-Star for the Knicks but didn’t play particularly well in two postseason appearances during the team’s three playoff series. He didn’t play last spring after undergoing season-ending shoulder surgery in April.
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Just before the start of training camp last fall, Randle was traded to Minnesota in a deal that sent fan favorite Karl-Anthony Towns to New York. After getting off to a shaky start with his new team, Randle missed the month of February because of a groin injury.
Since his return, however, Randle and the Timberwolves have found their groove, going 17-4 down the stretch. While it’s no surprise that young superstar Anthony Edwards has led the team in the playoffs (27 points, eight rebounds, five points per game), Randle’s emergence as a postseason force is welcome news for Timberwolves fans. He averaged 22.6 points during Minnesota’s five-game series win over the Lakers and is averaging 24.3 points in four games against Golden State.
Randle says that the Timberwolves’ young superstar reminds him a lot of Bryant.
“The mentality is very similar,” Randle told Andscape in October. “No hesitation. Ant gets right to it. He’s special. Physically, he’s gifted. Skill-wise, he’s gifted. Dude is different. There aren’t many players like him.
“Now I’m seeing his leadership, that he is charismatic, and his energy. He makes everybody believe. He’s special.”
And that’s one of the reasons why with him and Edwards at the helm, the Timberwolves are only a win away from a repeat trip to the Western Conference finals.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
