It’s over, the 2009 National Basketball Association (NBA) Finals that is.

The Los Angeles Lakers clinched the 15th overall league championship in their tradition-steeped history – and the first since 2002 – by beating the Orlando Magic, 99-86, in Game Five of their best-of-seven title showdown yesterday at the Amway Arena.

It was the Lakers’ second straight victory on the Magic’s home floor, winning the 63rd renewal of the NBA Finals via a 4-1 count. Last Friday, Kobe Bryant and his friends scored an epic 99-91 overtime decision over to take a commanding 3-1 lead.

Bryant collected 30 points, five assists and six rebounds, four blocks and two steals in yesterday’s series-clinching Game Five. Overall, the 6-6 star guard averaged 32.4 points (on .430 FG, .360 3-FG and .841 FT shooting), 7.4 assists, 5.6 boards and 1.40 steals in the five-game series to earn his first NBA Finals Most Valuable Player award and the Bill Russell Trophy that goes with the honor.

For Bryant, the latest NBA championship was truly a special one as it was his first without mammoth center Shaquille O’Neal, thereby fortifying his legacy in league history. Kobe played the secondary role of ”Robin” to Shaq’s “Batman” when the pair helped guide LA to titles in 2000, 2001 and 2002.

In their last trip to the NBA Finals together in 2004, the Lakers suffered a humiliating 4-1 debacle at the hands of Chauncey Billups and the Detroit Pistons. (LA also had Karl Malone and Gary Payton on its roster that year.)

O’Neal was traded to Miami that summer then romped away with his fourth ring in 2006 while playing second fiddle to All-Star guard Dwyane Wade with the Heat.

Bryant, on the other hand, was denied of a title a year ago when the Boston Celtics blasted his Lakers, four games to two, in the finals.

Meanwhile, the Lakers’ Phil Jackson romped away with his 10th championship as an NBA coach to surpass the venerable Arnold “Red” Auerbach on the all-time winningest list. Auerbach won nine rings with the Celtics during the fifties and sixties.

Overall, Jackson owns 11 championships, counting the ring he secured as a valuable reserve player with the New York Knicks in 1973. Jackson, a 6-8 forward-center, was injured during the entire 1969-70 season when the Knicks took their first ever NBA crown.