Kobe Bryant on how soccer taught him the Triangle principles long before Phil Jackson: "I start seeing the game three moves ahead"

Before Phil Jackson and Tex Winter ever diagrammed the triangle offense for him, the late Kobe Bryant had already lived inside one.

Kobe said as much himself, recalling at the Aspen Institute’s Project Play Summit in 2018 how it all began while he was playing soccer — where following a triangle system is also key — during his formative years in Europe.

Lying it all out in his typical detail-oriented way, the Los Angeles Lakers legend couldn’t help but chuckle at the irony, saying, “Can’t escape the triangle.”

Soccer triangles

If you’ve ever studied soccer tactics, you know triangles are everything. Wide, narrow, jagged, or perfectly symmetrical — it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that they give player A constant passing options to B and C. Defensively, the principle is the same: if one gets beaten, the others are perfectly positioned to rotate, cover, and recover.

Whole squads have built dynasties on this principle, like Pep Guardiola’s FC Barcelona in the late 2000s and early 2010s, whose triangle execution sparked their famous “Tiki-Taka” style.

A young Kobe got an early taste of this while growing up in Italy. His father was a professional player there, and soccer, well, it was basically the national religion. Kids spent every spare moment on the pitch, Bryant said, and not speaking the language at first, he naturally joined in.

Ultimately, it didn’t just help the future NBA icon fit in — it taught him the Triangle’s fundamentals: spatial awareness, timing, constant movement and communicating beyond words.

“Soccer, you’re playing in threes all the time. You’re playing in triangles all the time. So it’s not just my communication with you, but how this communication and the ball movement between us opens up something for that person. It’s not good enough for me to just simply think of you. I have to think boom, boom, boom; boom, boom, boom; boom, boom, boom. That’s how the game is played,” Bryant explained.

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Kobe showed court awareness from day one

At the time, Kobe — and really, no one — could have predicted just how vital those early soccer lessons would become. It took a few years before the connection really clicked. By the time he fully immersed himself in playing ball, everything started to make sense.

Looking back on that shift, Bryant remembered noticing something right away. In basketball, most players tend to move in pairs. He later pointed to pick-and-rolls and give-and-go plays as perfect examples. For most newcomers, adapting to this takes time — but not for young Kobe. Having already learned to operate in threes through soccer gave him an edge.

“When I played basketball, it helped me, at an early age, start seeing the game three moves ahead instead of just two,” said the 2008 MVP.

While the Black Mamba never gained a reputation as a pass-first player or the ultimate team guy, from the moment he seriously took up basketball, he possessed a sharp tactical sense. After returning to the United States at 13, that understanding deepened, and by the time he emerged as a phenomenon at Lower Merion High School, his basketball IQ was far beyond his years.

Looking back, it’s easy to assume that without his early soccer experience in Italy, Kobe might have lagged years behind in basketball development — and possibly might not have made his famous leap to the NBA straight out of high school in 1996.

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This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Nov 30, 2025, where it first appeared in the Old School section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.