SLO County team was preparing for a game at Kobe Bryant’s academy. Then, tragedy struck
San Luis Obispo County coaches and athletes mourned the death of Kobe Bryant, one day after a helicopter crash killed the Los Angeles Laker legend, an Orange Coast College baseball coach and seven others.
SLO youth basketball coach and host of “The Sports Bite” radio show on the local ESPN station, Mike Wozniak, said his youth 3Ball team was at the Mamba Sports Academy facility on Sunday for a youth basketball tournament.
That’s the sports center in Newbury Park where Kobe Bryant and the others who died in the helicopter that crashed were heading.
Wozniak said the team was preparing for an afternoon game when they learned the tournament was canceled because of the crash.
“Texts were flying around and a bunch of our players, seventh- and eighth-grade boys, took photos near the sign and were teary-eyed,” said Wozniak, a former Cal Poly basketball star.
Wozniak said he’d had a personal conversation with Bryant at the facility at a previous tournament.
“I kind of knew where he hung out there and found him and we talked about basketball,” Wozniak said. “We also talked about Bryson Thompson.” In May 2018, Bryant met with Thompson, of SLO, who suffers from epilepsy, on “The View,” to offer Thompson a jersey.
Wozniak said he’ll always remember Bryant’s last game of his career, in which he scored 60 points, and how he often exceeded expectations when the spotlight was brightest on him.
“I’m an Indiana Pacers fan, and I’ll remember when Kobe twisted his ankle (in the 2000 NBA finals),” Wozniak said. “He led the Lakers, and they went on to win the series. It was like, ‘Can you just take one day off, Kobe?’ But that was how he operated.”
Cal Poly assistant opened gym for Kobe and daughter
Cal Poly assistant basketball coach Justin Downer, said that he used to open the gym for Bryant at Vanguard University, an Orange County NAIA program where Downer coached last year.
The university is about a five-minute drive from the Bryants’ home in Newport Beach.
“He would come with his daughter (13-year-old Gigi) at 8 a.m. and again at 7 p.m.,” Downer said. “We always had a parking spot for him. He’d park his car, and I’d walk him in. We’d chat for about 30 seconds. It was always short and efficient, but always honest. He’d ask about our team. I’d watch him coach his daughter.”
Along with Bryant and the seven others, Gigi also died in Sunday’s wreck.
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Bryant’s oldest daughter (17-year-old Natalia) focused on volleyball rather than basketball, and his other two daughters, Bianka, 3, and Capri, 6 months, are still small, and so Kobe Bryant dedicated himself to training Gigi.
Downer said it was impressive to watch Bryant work with Gigi, as well as the rest of her club basketball team, Team Mamba, that worked out at the gym, adding that it showed a different side of the NBA legend.
“Watching Kobe coach his daughter in practice, watching him interact, it was so awesome,” Downer said. “It wasn’t just telling her what to do. There was real caring there.”
Downer said it will be hard to replicate the star power that Bryant brought to the women’s basketball game as well, forging friendships with top WNBA and collegiate stars, and showing up at games.
“What he was doing for the women’s basketball community, his presence and supporting them, and the way he was helping his daughter to develop, it will be hard to replace that,” Downer said.
Cal Poly coach will remember Kobe as competitor, father
Cal Poly head basketball coach John Smith — who coached at Cal State Fullerton and other Los Angeles-area programs — told The Tribune he’ll remember Bryant as an integral member of the L.A. community and one of his favorite players to witness up close as a fan.
“He was so tied into the city, and he seized every moment of every day,” Smith said. “His attention to detail was second to none. Even though his skill set was way better than others, he still focused on the mental side, and that shows you how important the mental side is.”
Smith also said that, as a father, he was impressed at Bryant’s ability to juggle family life and a pro basketball career, saying it was inspirational to watch his relationship with his daughters.
“If I could ask Kobe one thing, it would be ‘How did you rest?’” Smith said. “He was up at 3:30 a.m.. for workouts, and still was a family man. His discipline, his desire to be great, was unmatched. ... God, he’ll be missed.”
One of Smith’s former players, Smush Parker, whom he coached at the College of Southern Idaho, a junior college, went on to play alongside Kobe Bryant on the Lakers in the mid-2000s.
“Unfortunately, they didn’t get along,” Smith said. “But that was because Kobe challenged (Parker) to match him, to prepare the same way he did.”
Smith said that Bryant’s example is motivational to his Mustangs team in that each day Bryant wanted to get better and improve on his weaknesses, on and off the court, adding “that’s true in basketball and in life.”
“My heart goes out to Kobe and Coach Altobelli,” Smith said.
Pro athletes Jeff McNeil, David Nwaba weigh in
Other sports stars with local ties weighed in on the crash as well, including Jeff McNeil, a Nipomo High graduate who earned an all-star selection last season with the New York Mets.
McNeil credited Orange Coast College Coach John Altobelli with encouraging his baseball career during his difficult times as a young player.
“Tough to hear the news of Coach Altobelli,” McNeil tweeted. “One of my favorite coaches I have ever played for and one of the main reasons I got a chance to play professional baseball. Both the baseball and basketball world lost a great one today.”
David Nwaba, a former Cal Poly player who has played four seasons in the NBA, including the 2016-17 season with the Lakers, retweeted condolences to Bryant’s daughter that said “Rip Gigi” with emojis, as well as a video of Kobe celebrating the Philadelphia Eagles’ Super Bowl championship.
Nwaba joined the Lakers the year after Bryant famously ended his career with his 60-point performance versus the Utah Jazz in 2016.
Nwaba, who grew up in L.A., suffered a season-ending torn Achilles on Dec. 19, while playing for the Brooklyn Nets.
Bryant went to high school in Philadelphia and was drafted by the Lakers at age 17, going on to play 20 seasons in L.A., where he won five championships and earned 18 all-star selections.
Former interim USC head coach and University of Portland assistant basketball coach Bob Cantu, who’s hosting the 24th annual SLO County basketball camp this summer, tweeted that Bryant was his favorite player and “this is beyond tragic.”
Also killed in Sunday’s crash were Altobelli’s wife Keri and daughter Alyssa; a mother and daughter from Orange County, Sarah and Payton Chester; pilot Ara Zobayan; and Christina Mauser, a basketball coach and teacher from Corona del Mar whose husband, Matt Mauser, graduated from Cal Poly in 1994.
This story was originally published January 27, 2020 at 2:32 PM.
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