Presenter Michael Jordan kisses Vanessa Bryant on the head after Bryant spoke on behalf of her late husband, Kobe Bryant, after Bryant was enshrined as part of the 2020 Basketball Hall of Fame class on Saturday in Uncasville, Conn. (AP photo)

UNCASVILLE, Conn. — Vanessa Bryant took Michael Jordan’s hand and walked down from the stage, a familiar chant breaking out throughout the arena as she made her way back to her seat.

“Kobe! Kobe! Kobe!” the crowd shouted.

With that, he was — officially, finally — a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.

Kobe Bryant is in the Hall now, along with contemporaries Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett, headliners of a group of nine who got their delayed and long-awaited enshrinement on Saturday night, more than a year after being announced as the Hall’s Class of 2020.

“Right now, I’m sure he’s laughing in heaven, because I’m about to praise him in public,” Vanessa Bryant said.

And she did, her purple dress matching the traditional Los Angeles Lakers color, capping the night by giving the speech that her husband was not here to deliver.

“There will never be anyone like Kobe,” Vanessa Bryant said. “Kobe was one of a kind. He was special. He was humble — off the court — but bigger than life.”

Bryant, Duncan and Garnett were joined in the class by three-time NCAA champion coach Kim Mulkey, two-time NBA champion coach Rudy Tomjanovich, four-time Olympic gold medalist Tamika Catchings, three-time Final Four coach Eddie Sutton, 1,000-game winner Barbara Stevens and longtime FIBA secretary general Patrick Baumann.