Suddenly, Lakers Can’t Even Cut the Nets Down

Magic Johnson is worried. Is it any wonder?

The Lakers put on another bad performance Friday night, their third in a row, but instead of being able to pull out a victory in spite of themselves--as they did at Indianapolis--the Lakers dropped a 121-106 decision to the New Jersey Nets in as disturbing a game as they’ve had in a while.

What happened to the Lakers in the Meadowlands Arena has become a cause for concern. It happened in a loss to Boston, it happened against the Pacers and it happened again in this loss to the struggling Nets.

For some reason, the Laker offense has been disappearing.

“We’re being brought down to reality on a regular basis lately,” Coach Pat Riley said.

Johnson admitted he is puzzled.

“We have no offensive flow--nothing,” Johnson said. “We’ve had funk periods before, but they’ve never lasted this long. I think we’ll snap out of it, but I’m still concerned.

“I don’t like to play like this. This is unfamiliar territory. We have to get better quickly or it’ll be contagious and stay with us.”

Even without the injured Darryl Dawkins and Mike O’Koren, the Nets broke their four-game losing streak by crushing the Lakers on the backboards on their way to a 20-point lead in the first half, then watched the Lakers blow a chance to win when the game was on the line.

New Jersey led by 18 points early in the third quarter, but the Lakers came back behind Kareem Adbul-Jabbar to tie the score at 88-88 early in the fourth.

Then the Lakers folded up quickly. In the next 8 minutes 32 seconds, their offense produced exactly six points.

Buck Williams worked the Lakers over, and the Nets put the game away on a 109-94 lead with 2:41 left.

Where did it all go wrong?

It started on Mike Gminski’s three-point play for the Nets that broke the 88-88 tie. Johnson missed a long jumper, and Micheal Ray Richardson scored for the Nets on a breakaway layup. Then the Lakers’ Mitch Kupchak traveled, and the Nets’ Mickey Johnson knocked in a short jumper.

Michael Cooper came back with a dunk for the Lakers, but Abdul-Jabbar lost the ball to Mickey Johnson, and Magic threw the ball away for another turnover.

Williams scored six points in the next two minutes, the Lakers committed another turnover, and it was over.

It had actually looked over for the Lakers by halftime, when the Nets led by 17 points, 66-49. But Riley juggled his lineup for the third quarterm, and the Lakers got back in the game.

James Worthy missed his first game of the season, sitting this one out with a bruised groin, so Riley started Cooper in his place. But after the Nets built a 28-18 rebounding edge in the first half, Riley started seldom-used Larry Spriggs in the second half and inserted Maurice Lucas in place of Kurt Rambis.

That combination got things going for a while, until the roof caved in on the Lakers.

“I was just trying to shake things up,” Riley said.

Abdul-Jabbar finished with 28 points in 41 minutes, and Johnson had 20 points, but the Nets were more well-rounded with their offense. Mickey Johnson led with 21 points, Gminski had 20 and Albert King, normally a forward but a starter this time at guard, also had 20.

The Lakers found nobody who could handle Williams, who had 15 rebounds. Gminski added 12 to help the Nets post an overpowering 52-38 advantage on the backboards.

The Laker defense, after a shaky first quarter in which the Nets scored 37 points, wasn’t too bad. But it was the offense that betrayed the Lakers--the same offense that scored only 99 points against Boston and a season-low 90 against Indiana. The only reason the Lakers got over 100 points against the Nets was because of garbage time.

The highest-scoring team in the league is having a lot of trouble scoring.

“We just can’t go anywhere anymore and think we are going to win,” Riley said. “We are just getting totally outplayed.”

To a large degree, the offense is to blame.

Johnson came up with 10 assists, but the rest of the Lakers combined had only 8. New Jersey’s defense came up with 12 steals, 8 in the first half, and that stopped up the Laker offensive flow as much as anything.

“Usually when we have trouble, it’s the defense,” Johnson said. “But now it’s the offense. I can’t believe it.

“I’m just very glad we’ve got a lot of time left to straight ourselves out,” he said. “We don’t have to panic or anything. What’s confusing is our record (40-14). We look at it, think we got all this, then we struggle like we’re on a roller coaster.”

For the Lakers, the ride is becoming bumpy.

Laker Notes After looking at some box scores, the Lakers discovered that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar had already broken Elvin Hayes’ record for minutes played. Abdul-Jabbar did it last Friday against Atlanta. Hayes finished his career with 50,000 minutes played. . . . Abdul-Jabbar will break another NBA record held by Hayes--games played--when the Lakers play Sunday at Philadelphia. That will be Abdul-Jabbar’s 1,304th game in his 17-year career. . . . The Nets sold out Meadowlands Arena for the Lakers, marking their first sellout of the season. Since moving into the Meadowlands in 1981, the Nets have sold out only five other regular-season games. The Lakers have had 15 sellouts at the Forum this season. . . . Rod Higgins signed a 10-day contract Friday with the Nets, his fifth team since October. Higgins began the season with Chicago and has also played with Seattle and San Antonio--as well as with the Tampa Bay Thrillers of the Continental Basketball Assn.