J.A. Adande: A year later, Fisher reflects on longest day of his career

Help from above? On a day when his infant daughter went through surgery for cancer in her eye, Derek Fisher was somehow able to help the Jazz win Game 2 of the Western Conference semis only hours later.

The shot derek fisher made with .4 seconds remaining in a 2004 playoff game in San Antonio still resonates, drawing huge cheers when it's shown at Lakers games, the wound to the Spurs so deeply embedded that coach Gregg Popovich referenced it a couple of weeks ago as a warning to his team of how games and series can turn.

To Fisher, it's only the second biggest shot of his career.

He'll tell you a shot he made a year ago Friday ranks above it. Perhaps the score and the time weren't as dramatic. The game log records it as going in with 1:06 remaining in overtime and putting the Jazz ahead by six points in Game 2 of the Western Conference semifinals.

It's everything that came before that shot that makes it so significant, the fact that it came at the end of a day Fisher and his family began in New York, trying to save his infant daughter's life. The shot came with no time to warm up, in a game he wasn't even sure he would play.

"That shot was bigger from the standpoint of just the ability to focus enough and have enough energy on that day to make a positive contribution to the team," Fisher said. "I think that was bigger than the shot I hit in San Antonio.

"I think that it really symbolized the power of prayer. When people are thinking of you and praying for you, that's how that works. I know for sure that's the only way I was able to kind of get through that day without breaking down. It was a very long day."

That day started in the 6 o'clock hour on a Wednesday morning in New York. Fisher's family had spent the previous two days there, seeking medical advice for the rare form of cancer in his 10-month-old daughter's eye. On Tuesday, their doctor recommended a surgical procedure, and they decided to do it the next day.

So the Fisher family arrived at the hospital at 7 a.m. to check in baby Tatum and get her prepared. Surgery was supposed to start about 10 a.m., but doctors had to respond to another emergency elsewhere in the hospital, causing an hour delay. Tatum didn't know what was happening, but she was uncomfortable and unhappy, and there was nothing her parents could do to appease her. They couldn't feed her because she wasn't allowed to eat before the surgery. Derek Fisher felt helpless, and that was before he finally had to leave Tatum on the surgery table, taking one last look at her as the gravity of the situation kicked in.

"I was just scared, man," Fisher said. "I had no idea what was going to happen after this. We were still learning about this. We were still learning about the cancer and the disease and what our lives were about to become. I think that was the first time I ever thought there's a possibility she might not be the same again."

The surgery lasted more than two hours.

"That seems like an eternity when you're there," Fisher said.

Even after the surgery was over and deemed successful, it was hours before they could leave the hospital. They had to make sure Tatum's heart rate and blood pressure were normal. She had to show she could eat food without throwing up. It was 4 p.m. on the East Coast when she was released.

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