Matt Barnes' Mohawk has meaning

Matt Barnes lost his mother to cancer four years ago and not a day goes by when he doesn't think of her when he touches his bracelet, looks at the picture of her in his living room or sees her smile in the faces of his twin boys, Carter and Isaiah, who were born nearly one year to the day Barnes's mother discovered she had cancer.
Ann Barnes was diagnosed with lung cancer on Nov. 1, 2007, and died on Nov. 27, 2007. Barnes discovered his mother's condition just before the Golden State Warriors' season opener that year. She died 26 days later. It's a reality Barnes still has a difficult time coming to grips with as his twin boys run around the house as his fiancee, Gloria Govan, chases after them.

"I miss my mom," Barnes said Saturday on the eve of the Lakers' first-round playoff game against the New Orleans Hornets. "It saddens me but at the same time I know she's not in pain anymore. I know she's looking down on me and I know she's excited for what I'm about to do."

One of the fondest memories Barnes said he had of his mother was the look on her face after she first saw him and his new Mohawk before the Golden State Warriors' improbable run in the 2007 NBA playoffs and the joy she shared with him and the team that year as they became the first No. 8 seed to upset a No. 1 seed in a seven-game playoff series.

"After the All-Star break that season we were like 16 games out and I was talking with Baron Davis and Stephen Jackson and we were like, 'What if we made the playoffs?' and I said I would get a Mohawk never thinking it would happen," Barnes said. "The day before the playoffs I got the Mohawk and drove to Sacramento and showed it to my mom. I was wearing a hat and wanted to cut it off and she said, 'No, I like it on you. I love it.'"

While Barnes got his haircut, his right knee was wrapped and attached to a device that buzzes in the background and adjusts the cold and compression. After missing the last two games of the regular season, he said his knee felt better than it had in three weeks since getting fluid drained from it.

Govan smiled as she looked at her husband's nearly completed Mohawk.

"Now it's become such a trademark," she said. "When the playoffs come now people expect it and it brings this whole new kind of attitude into Matt and it's really cool to see him transform into that person and player."

Barnes said he knew he would probably get teased by fans and teammates for the new haircut, but he smiled when he looked at a picture of him and his mother wearing his Golden State jersey in 2007. As he got up from the chair after his haircut, he brushed himself of and looked at the mirror. He smiled as he touched the sides of his shaved head and looked up.

"It makes me smile more now when I think about the haircut," Barnes said. "Knowing that she loved the haircut and was a part of that experience with us and dying shortly after. It was basically her final memory of me playing, so it makes me smile a lot more."