Pau Gasol is the incredible shrinking Laker

SALT LAKE CITY -- Did you see the craziness of the video-game highlight, Kobe Bryant 2008, a toss against the backboard that he caught for a dunk?

Did you feel the floor burns of those three steals, Grand Theft Basketball 2008, consecutive heists in the final minutes?

Did you hear the Lakers come back from a 10-point deficit midway through the fourth quarter Friday night to silence the head-throbbing noise and nearly trash the best home court in basketball?

"We could have won this game," Lamar Odom said, shaking his head.

But the story was what you didn't see.

The moral was what you couldn't feel.

The outcome was due, in part, to what you could barely hear.

paugasol.

Faced with the most intense, physical postseason game of his career, late-season giant Pau Gasol shrank to an indiscernible size in the Lakers' 104-99 loss to the Utah Jazz at EnergySolutions Arena.

With their first loss in seven postseason games, the Lakers weren't the only ones to reveal their spring mortality.

Gasol, a novice in these deeper waters, proved he also can sink.

Handed its first real test of June-worthiness, that great basketball brain flunked.

Faced with its first playoff adversity, that gentle smile became a whine.

Jarred for the first time with playoff desperation, those beautiful passes were junked.

"It was loud," Gasol said. "It was intense."

In his tired eyes you could see the confirmation of one more sentence.

It was awful.

For the first time in this postseason, Gasol did not dress in the crowded visiting locker area afterward, instead retrieving his clothes and dressing in a quieter spot in the back.

It was precisely that way in the game.

Suddenly, if the Lakers aren't careful with their two-games-to-one lead, it could be that way for the rest of the summer