Dallas’ Smoking 45 Is Advantage Lakers Just Can’t Overcome

The Lakers woke up this morning trying to shake off the effects of a Lost Weekend. This means you can put that Laker bye into the championship series on hold for a while.

After spending four days trying to rid themselves of the Dallas Mavericks, the Lakers are no closer to getting it done than they were when they left the Forum with a 2-0 lead in their Western Conference semifinal series.

Now that it’s 2-2, the Lakers must be reeling, right?

“I’m a long way from being scared,” Magic Johnson said. “You get scared when you’re down 3-2.”

That possibility doesn’t seem quite so remote any more, not after Mark Aguirre scored 21 of his 39 points in the first quarter and the Mavericks held on to defeat the Lakers, 120-118, Sunday afternoon at Reunion Arena.

So for the second straight game, the Mavericks beat the Lakers by two points, although this one wasn’t like Friday’s game except for the outcome.

Not until Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s 14-foot hook shot rimmed out at the buzzer were the Lakers finally through, although they certainly seemed to be heading that way in the early going.

Aguirre’s uncanny 10-for-13 shooting helped the Mavericks score 45 points in the first quarter for a lead that was threatened only once before the last three minutes of the game.

This may be unsettling to the Lakers, but Aguirre said he is merely feeling more comfortable out on the floor.

“I’m shooting outside, inside, dribbling up on the break, doing everything I can possibly do,” Aguirre said.

Kurt Rambis, the unlucky Laker who started guarding Aguirre, hopes Aguirre can’t think of anything else to do.

“You front him and they lob over my head,” Rambis said. “You play behind him and he drives past you. Or he shoots a jumper. As a defensive player, you want to take away one or two things, but he took advantage of everything .”

In 40 minutes, Aguirre launched 30 shots, and 19 of them went in. The Mavericks made 71% of their field goals in the first quarter in a numbingly efficient shooting display from which the Lakers couldn’t quite recover.

“Mark was unconscious,” Johnson said. “I’ve seen him do that before. But, please, no more in this series! I know how Mark was feeling. You feel like nothing can stop you at that point in time.”

Actually, nothing and nobody stopped Aguirre, with the possible exception of his own back, which tightened up on him at the end of the first quarter.

With the Mavericks up, 45-33, after one period, Aguirre stretched out his aching back in the locker room, then returned to see the Lakers tighten up on the Mavericks in a late run.

Abdul-Jabbar, who scored 33 points in 39 minutes, began the Laker stretch drive with a three-point play that brought them within 111-106 with 5:19 left.

Although the Mavericks made just three baskets the last five minutes, Sam Perkins scored 2 of his 23 points on a pair of free throws with 3:19 to go and put Dallas ahead, 116-110.

Abdul-Jabbar scored in the lane, then Johnson tipped in a missed shot, kept alive by Maurice Lucas, and the Lakers were down by only two points.

But Perkins sank a 22-footer, just beating the 24-second clock, and after both Abdul-Jabbar and James Donaldson misfired, Lucas scored on a tip-in to cut the Maverick lead to 118-116 with 1:08 left.

Derek Harper’s shot bounced away, but neither Johnson nor Lucas got to the ball before it went out of bounds, which was a mistake since a Laker touched it last.

Given another chance, Aguirre’s 15-footer from the left baseline put the Mavericks ahead again by four points, 120-116, with 38 seconds left. Johnson explained why the Lakers had not tried harder for the basketball.

“I thought Luke had it,” Johnson said. “Then when Luke didn’t have it, I thought Perkins had kicked it out. I never could have gotten to it.”

The Lakers thought they had a chance when Byron Scott made two free throws and the Mavericks failed to get a shot up to beat the 24-second clock.

So with six seconds left, the Lakers called time out and drew up a play for Abdul-Jabbar to shoot, tie the game and send it into overtime. Simple, but it didn’t work out that way.

With two seconds left, Abdul-Jabbar received a pass from Johnson and turned to shoot a skyhook as Donaldson guarded him closely.

“I fumbled the ball at the last second,” Abdul-Jabbar said.

His shot was long, and now the longshot Mavericks are right back in the series. For that, they can thank not only Aguirre and Perkins, but also Derek Harper, who once again hurt the Lakers.

Harper drilled three three-pointers to give him seven for the series. Harper has made 7 of 10 from beyond the three-point line, which means he is shooting better at that distance than Magic is shooting from the free-throw line.

Johnson, who has made only 67.4% of his free throws in the playoffs, missed four more Sunday, but that was the only bad part of his game.

In 43 minutes, Johnson had 29 points, 15 rebounds and 14 assists, his second triple-double of the playoffs. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to keep the Lakers from losing again.

Abdul-Jabbar considered what Sunday’s loss means to the Lakers.

“It’s a three-game series now,” he said. “We’re still playing the same team. They’re not going to come with any rabbits out of the hat. We haven’t lost any confidence. If we had gotten blown out, that might have been the case.”

Scott broke loose for 22 points in 39 minutes, and although Rolando Blackman countered with 28 points, Scott did not allow Blackman to score after Riley put him back in the game with 5:02 left.

The Lakers are still in good shape, Scott said.

“We’ve got to win two of three, and two of the games are on our home territory,” he said. “I don’t think they can play any better than that. But I may be wrong.”

If he is, the Lakers may be beaten, and that bye would have looked like a pretty good idea.

Laker Notes

The Mavericks’ 45 points tied the NBA playoff record for a first quarter. The Lakers had 45 against Phoenix last season. . . . Mark Aguirre’s 21 points in the first quarter was only two short of the NBA playoff individual record for one quarter held by Gus Williams and Bernard King. . . . Although the Lakers outrebounded Dallas, 38-28, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar had only one rebound in 39 minutes, none in the second half. Maverick center James Donaldson had 11, but he also finished with just six points. . . . How well did the Mavericks shoot? Good enough that 7-0 rookie center Bill Wennington made a three-pointer, the first of his career. The Mavericks’ 59.8 shooting percentage for Game 4 was a club record. . . . After the game, Laker Coach Pat Riley reacted angrily to some of Dallas Coach Dick Motta’s statements, among them the prediction that the Lakers would probably not repeat as NBA champions. “I’m not a coach who tries to create a situation that rapes players of their dignity,” Riley said. “He (Motta) has not shown dignity for our club. Getting into b.s. psychological wheeling and dealing is not my game. All I know is, we’ve choked our way to three world championships.” . . . Game 5 Tuesday night at the Forum will be televised by Prime Ticket Network, and CBS will televise Game 6 Thursday night at Dallas. A spokesman for Channel 2 said a decision probably will be made today as to whether Game 6 will be televised live in L.A. or at 11:30 p.m., as in the rest of the country.