#NBA #Straya – NEVER FORGET – NBA Finals Edition!!!
How’s this? Can you believe it’s 23 years TO THE BLOODY DAY, that our old mate Luc ‘Lucien’ Longley — aka Outback Billy Russell — was out there crushing it alongside the 
🐐 MJ and Scottie Pippen on the ’96 Chicago Bulls … while going up against my beloved Seattle #Supersonicsin the NBA Finals!
That’s right, the Giant Sandgroper was patrolling the paint for the Bulls against Gary ‘The Glove’ Payton and the Reignman himself, Shawn Kemp, and doing a bloody admirable job in leading the Bulls to the title!
And look, while the Sonics may’ve stomped the Bulls by 21 in game 4, it was through no fault of The Thunder From Down Under.
Matched up against the immortal Frank Brickowski — a name so apt the only way to top it would be for Kevin Love to change his name to ‘Kevin Spud’ or King Delly (Matty Dellavedova) to Matthew DellaveCurryStopper — Big Lucien went to work with more relish than your old man making his signature ham and cheese sanger!
Dominating Brickowski like he was Billy Brownless at the Smorgys Sunday All-You-Can-Eat Buffet, Lucky Luc shot 5-of-8 from fro the field and was a PERFECT 2-for-2 from the charity stripe for a crucial 12 points.
He also ripped down 3 rebounds because bloody Dennis Rodman stole the rest… but Luc made up for it in other ways, handing off 3 assists more perfect than the 1-minute-and-48-seconds that make up Grinspoon’s ‘Just Ace’.
And in a display of rim-protection only usually seen when you try to slip one past the missus, Luc also had a block that was so vicious that Steve Scheffler almost scheffled himself.
Unfortunately for the Bulls, the reason they lost is probably because The Towering Monstrosity of Lucien only played 25 minutes due to the refs — even back then — having an extreme case of Anti-Strayan bias, and slapping the big fella with 5 absolute rubbish fouls.
Oh well. Still, the Bulls were up 3-0 in the series, and Big Luc clearly wanted the Bulls to celebrate the title on their own floor, so let my Sonics have this one. And rumour has it that Big Luc respected the play of Kemp & Payton so much that for once he DIDN’T reverse kanga the visitor’s dunnies!
Not a bloody bad showing from our man… and two games later, the Thunder From Down Under would have his first ring… and be on his way to an OAM (when he should be given a bloody Knighthood).
#ONYA Big Lucien!
** Smash the NBA Straya podcast HERE **
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/nba-straya/id1313092126…
** and check out NBA Straya on Twitter **
https://twitter.com/NbaStraya
AND BUY MATT LOGUE’S AWESOME NEW BOOK – ‘HOOP DREAMS DOWN UNDER’
