Kobe discovered that he had so many trustworthy teammates. "Paul (Gasol) and I have become extraordinarily synchronized. I even sent him a message at 3 a.m., telling him to get ready for tomorrow's game, and he replied me right away." The Lakers finally opened the door to the finals. "We are back on the stage where we didn't perform well last year," Kobe said, "hopefully we can do a good job this time."