Los Angeles Lakers: Kobe Bryant’s best game against every team in NBA

Kobe Bryant’s best game against the Seattle SuperSonics – Kobe sets the single-game 3-point record in 2003

When Kobe entered the league he really was not a three-point shooter, Phil Jackson even points it out in Kobe’s Book “Memba Mentality” in the introduction stating

"“At one point in our early years with the Lakers, Kobe and I stood together before practice and watched five of the other players hold a shooting contest. It was similar to the game “Cat,” where a player had to mirror and match the shooter before him, or he was eliminated. They had asked me to hold off the start of practice because the game went around, the entire arc, using both corners, both wings, and the top. I asked Kobe, competitive as he was, why he didn’t play against his teammates, and he said it was because he wasn’t a three-point shooter. But in the year that followed, he was determined to fix that: During the off-season Kobe worked diligently on his three-point shot. It was always the details.”"

Kobe’s determination to get better at every facet of his game allowed him to develop into one of the best outside shooters the game has ever seen. When he got hot he could hit as many as anyone, and in 2003 he proved that by hitting what was then an NBA record 12 three-pointers in a game.

His record was eventually broken by Klay Thompson in 2018, but the current league is a different era in the NBA that is three-pointer happy. Kobe broke this record when he was not considered a sharpshooter and the three-pointer was not considered a high percentage shot.