GAME 4: LAKERS VS. ROCKETS : Rockets Say (Publicly) They Are Still Underdog : But They Have the Unstoppable Olajuwon, Reid and a 3-1 Lead Over the Lakers

Ebullience, thy name art Robert Reid, the improbable point guard of the improbable Rockets, who looked at the disarray of the world champion Lakers late Sunday afternoon and found it good.

Reid became the latest winner of the Rockets’ MHA (Most Helpful to Akeem) award, coming all the way back from his opening-game 2-for-7 shooting to score 23 points, second on the team to Akeem Olajuwon’s 35, as the Rockets won, 105-95, to take a 3-1 hold in the Western Conference finals.

This gave Reid the opportunity to say a few last words over the champs, some of which went like this:

“The Lakers are starting to sense, ‘Hey, these guys cut us pretty deep, this is a deep wound.’ There’s blood on the floor. Now we want to go for the kill.”

A man should be happy in his work.

Ebullience’s name, however, could be any of the 12 on the Rocket roster, even the less heralded ones such as Rodney McCray (48 minutes, 12 points, 12 rebounds, 6 assists).

Or Jim Petersen, the third tower, the low-slung one that sits back in the alley, behind the more famous Twins. Petersen relieved foul-burdened Ralph Sampson with 8:53 left in the third period and helped hold Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to 2-for-8 shooting over 16:28. Sampson left with the Lakers ahead, 60-58. When he returned, the Rockets led, 96-90, with 4:25 left in the game.

Petersen is 6-10, 235, and a willing grappler. He was a third-round draft choice out of Minnesota a year ago, and more than a little obscured by the No. 1, who was Akeem. Nevertheless, Petersen stuck and has played well.

“One thing that’s helped me so much is I get the opportunity to play against the greatest basketball player in the world,” Petersen says. “Akeem Olajuwon has become unstoppable.

“I’m never going to say I held Kareem Abdul-Jabbar down. It could come back to haunt you. I just say I got a great team effort. I couldn’t hold him down without the other players coming to the ball.

“How much taller is Kareem than I am? It seems like five inches. When I stand next to him, it’s like I’m looking at his neck. When he sticks his arm up to shoot, it’s like it’s 10 feet over my head.”

By the end of the game, Abdul-Jabbar was looking . . . what? Once he let a perfect Magic Johnson pass into the low post whistle, untouched, out of bounds. He just wasn’t looking for it.

Abdul-Jabbar shot 7 for 12 in the first half, 3 for 9 in the second. Is he as tired as Tommy Heinsohn kept promising he’d be?

Reid: “I can’t say if he’s tired or not, but we’ve got Ralph and Akeem. Then we bring Petersen in. That’s three big bodies on him. Everybody’s leaning on him. Maybe it’s something he isn’t used to. Then we’ve got everybody coming back (double- and triple-teaming) in our kamikaze-style defense, making him do things he doesn’t want to do. . . .

“The Lakers are a fast break, running team. When you keep them off it, you take their primary weapon away, the James Worthy dunks, Byron Scott coming off the break and pulling up on the wing.

“And that’s that many more times that Kareem has to come down the floor on offense, six, eight times a quarter. It’s like, ‘Hey, Big Fella, we didn’t get the break, you’ve got to come down and help us out.’ ”

Everywhere the Lakers look, there’s another grisly stat. Abdul-Jabbar is averaging 27 points a game in this series, but the Rockets have sawed his shooting percentage down, from 56% in the regular season to 48%.

The Lakers averaged 119 points a game during the regular season. Over the last three (102, 109, 95), they’re at 102.

The Lakers, a plus-four team in rebound differential during the season, were out-rebounded by an average of 10 a game for the first three games in this series. Vowing to return (“I’m angry,” said Magic Johnson), they came out Sunday and got out-rebounded, 49-38.

On the theory that sleeping champions should be allowed to lie, the Rockets tried to contain their exuberance. Did the taunts of Dallas’ Dick Motta psych the Lakers up in the last series? Rocket Coach Bill Fitch continued praising Caesar.

Wasn’t a 3-1 lead safe enough for a little crowing? Fitch recalled that it was his very own Celtics in 1981, who rubbed out a 3-1 76ers lead.

“We’re still the underdogs,” Sampson said. “Very definitely. Why? Because they’re the world champions. They know the situation. They got those rings on their fingers from last year.”

Fitch: “We’re not in any driver’s seat. We’re going to keep sitting in the same seat we’ve been in, until somebody taps us on the shoulder and says, ‘You did good.’ ”

OK, already. It might not be the driver’s seat, but whatever it is, it’s popular in Houston.