Shaquille O’Neal gave a heartfelt tribute to Kobe Bryant on Tuesday, describing his feelings after learning about the NBA superstar's tragic death.

The L.A. Lakers and L.A. Clippers were slated to play at The Staples Center on Tuesday, but the game was canceled by the NBA. Initially, the league received a wave of criticism from fans for making teams play just hours after Bryant's death was officially announced. 

In place of the game, TNT had NBA stars and coaches who knew Bryant speak about his life and impact on their own lives.

Through tears, O’Neal spoke about how painful it was to find out about what happened to Bryant and his daughter.

“The last couple months have been really tough. I lost my little sister. I haven’t been doing the normal things I usually do. I work, we laugh, we kid, we joke. When I get back home I look at reality and say she’s gone and it just hurts. So the other day I’m downstairs working with my son Shaqir and my nephew Columbus and my other nephew comes in crying, and he shows me his phone, and I snapped at him. I said, ‘Man get that out of my face,'” O’Neal said while sitting next to his TNT co-hosts Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley and Dwyane Wade.

“I lost two grandmothers, lost a Sarge, lost my sister. And now I lost a little brother,” he said. “Our names will be attached together for what we did. People always asked about our relationship, and I tell them it’s just like me and Charles. You got two strong-minded people who are gonna get it done their way, gonna say certain things, the respect will never be lost but when it comes to be inside the lines and win. That's’ what me and him, that's’ what we did. That’s what me and Charles, that’s what we do.”

O’Neal went on to talk about how scared he was about the possibility that his other former teammate Rick Fox may have been on the helicopter as well.

When news of the helicopter crash first emerged, the internet circulated reports that Fox was with Bryant at the time. Fox spoke about the situation on the TNT broadcast.

When Fox heard about Bryant's death, he was with his kids trying to make sense of the tragedy and ignoring his cellphone in the process. It was only after his best friend called him repeatedly that he realized people thought he had died too. 

“I started crying. And he was like, ‘You’re alive!’ And I'm thinking, ‘Well, yeah. Like what do you mean?’ And it was in that moment that my phone just started going, and my mom and my sister and my brother […] This has been a lot to process for all of us,” he said.

Fox's stepdaughter eventually sent out a message on Twitter confirming that he was still alive and was not with Bryant at the time of the crash. Fox spent seven seasons on the Lakers with both Bryant and O’Neal.

The TNT broadcast included dozens of testimonials from former teammates of Bryant as well as coaches, fans and broadcasters who spent decades covering the illustrious career of the NBA legend. 

Bryant and O'Neal won three championships in a row together in Los Angeles from 2000-2002 but had an acrimonious fallout at the end of their run. Since both men retired, they put aside their past differences and had become close, with Bryant even mentoring O’Neal's son. 

O’Neal led a chant outside the Staples Center after the TNT broadcast ended.

During his speech, O’Neal's said the two will always be linked because of what they accomplished but he will always mourn the fact that he can no longer joke about their past feuds.

“We up here, we work a lot. And a lot of times we take stuff for granted. Like, I don’t talk to you guys as much as I need to. The fact that we're not going to be able to joke at his Hall of Fame ceremony. We're not gonna be able to say ‘Ha, I got five you got four.' The fact that we’re not going to be able to say ‘If we stayed together we could have got 10.' Those are the things you can’t get back," O’Neal said.

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