Davis’ Personal Problems Give Suns Personnel Problems, Lakers a Win

At this point, there is absolutely nothing going wrong for the Lakers. But for the Phoenix Suns, there isn’t much going right.

The Lakers and Suns, the league’s best and worst teams, met Thursday night, then took off in their respective directions. So, what happened at the Forum really wasn’t very surprising, unlike what happened to Walter Davis in Oakland.

Just a few hours after losing Davis, who missed the game because of unspecified personal problems, the Suns had the misfortune of playing a game with the Lakers. They lost that, too.

It was strictly no contest. What did you expect? The Lakers crushed the Suns, not as badly as the 44-point blowout the first time they played, but it still added up to a 127-102 Laker victory, their 19th win in 21 games this season. There were some noteworthy achievements:

--The Lakers passed the ball as well as they have all year and finished with 37 assists.

--Magic Johnson matched his own NBA season high with 20 assists.

--Kareem Abdul-Jabbar tried 11 shots and made them all to finish with 24 points.

“Maybe I’m improving,” he said.

The Suns had also been improving, winning three straight coming in, even though their 6-17 record remains the worst in the league.

This one would have been a laugher if the circumstances surrounding Davis hadn’t made it so serious.

“It’s an unfortunate experience for them and for him,” Laker Coach Pat Riley said. “It’s no doubt we caught a decimated team.”

Davis missed the Suns’ flight from San Francisco Thursday morning, and Phoenix Coach John MacLeod did not know anything was wrong until General Manager Jerry Colangelo telephoned him after the team arrived in Los Angeles.

Colangelo dispatched assistant coach Al Bianchi to Oakland to stay with Davis, apparently until a team of NBA counselors arrived.

The Suns sent a carefully worded message to the NBA security office and the league’s public relation directors, but it shed little light on the Davis situation.

Colangelo would neither confirm nor deny that Davis’ problems were drug-related. According to the message, Davis would miss the Suns-Lakers game because of personal problems.

“Davis has come forward seeking help and is currently in the hands of league counselors,” the Suns said.

MacLeod said the Suns will make a further statement today about Davis.

“It will clarify a lot of speculation that now exists,” MacLeod said.

Davis, the Suns’ leading scorer this season, matched his career high of 43 points Wednesday night against the Golden State Warriors, but he called Colangelo Thursday morning and asked for help, MacLeod said.

MacLeod said he had no previous indication that anything was wrong with Davis.

“It came as a shock,” he said. “I was surprised. That’s the way life goes. One minute you’re cruising, and the next minute the bottom falls out.”

MacLeod said he spoke several times with Davis on the telephone Thursday afternoon and reaffirmed the team’s support of Davis.

“I let him know that if he needed to talk, I’d be there,” MacLeod said. “Certainly, everybody is very, very concerned about him.”

The Suns do not yet know how long they will be without Davis.

“It might be three, four, five or six weeks,” MacLeod said. “Hopefully, it will be three weeks, but you can’t put a timetable on this.”

Alvan Adams didn’t play for the Suns, either. Adams tore a calf muscle Wednesday night, so Phoenix had only 10 players available. With Davis and Adams out, the Suns were so short-handed that MacLeod had to do some serious lineup juggling that worked about as well as you might expect.

At guard, MacLeod started Bernard Thompson, whose playing time this season had amounted to 14 minutes. MacLeod also shifted Michael Sanders from forward to guard and moved Giorgi Glouchkov, who had played two minutes in two weeks, from 12th man to backup power forward.

In spite of all the chaos, the Suns stayed reasonably close for the first half, which ended with a 66-48 Laker lead. Although Larry Nance finished with 23 points, the absence of Davis was a handicap from which the Suns could not recover.

They worked hard, especially in the fourth quarter when they cut a 20-point Laker lead to 11, which was the signal for Riley to bring Abdul-Jabbar and Johnson back into the game.

“I didn’t want it to get to six or seven and then bring them back,” Riley said. “I didn’t want to mess around and let this one get away.”

Soon after that, Phoenix center James Edwards fouled out, and the Suns were done. James Worthy thought they were done long before that because Davis wasn’t around.

“We could tell on their faces there wasn’t any desire there,” said Worthy, who like Davis is a former North Carolina star.

“He was the perfect role model,” Worthy said. “I always looked up to Walter. As long as I’ve known him, he never had any problems.”

Laker Notes Kareem Abdul-Jabbar played in his 1,270th game and tied John Havlicek for No. 2 on the all-time list. Elvin Hayes played 1,303 games, more than anyone else, although Abdul-Jabbar should pass Hayes this season . . . Abdul-Jabbar said he was surprised when he learned about the Walter Davis situation, adding: “I wish him a speedy and complete recovery from whatever problems he has.” . . . The Lakers, who have played 11 of their last 15 games at the Forum, must play five of their next six on the road, beginning tonight at Denver.