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NEW YORK: National Basketball Association Most Valuable Player Kobe
Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics forward Kevin
Garnett led voting for the NBA All-Defensive Team announced on
Monday.
Bryant and Garnett, whose clubs could meet in
next month’s NBA Finals, each had 52 total points and 24
first-team votes (worth two points) in balloting by the league’s
30 coaches, who could not vote for players on their own clubs.
It was the ninth All-Defensive nod for Garnett
and the eighth for Bryant, who were joined on the first team by San
Antonio’s Tim Duncan and Bruce Bowen and Denver center Marcus
Camby.
Garnett, who was earlier named the NBA Defensive
Player of the Year, led the Celtics with 9.2 rebounds a game as
Boston kept rivals to a league-low 41.9 percent shooting from the
field, keeping foes to 90.3 points a game after allowing 99.2 a game
last season.
Camby, last year’s NBA Defensive Player of the
Year, had 37 points. He led the league with 3.61 blocked shots a
game and ranked second in rebounds with 13.1 a game to make the
squad for the second time.
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