THE NBA PLAYOFFS : Malone: Are the Lakers Out of Miracles?

With a sly smile, Karl (the Mailman) Malone said he has a message he wants sent to the Lakers.

“We’re going back to L.A.,” the Utah Jazz forward proclaimed here Wednesday afternoon. “That’s a guarantee.”

In another time and in another place, Malone’s words would be dismissed as so much bravado, the last gasp of a would-be challenger on the verge of being knocked through the ropes by the Lakers, who lead their Western Conference semifinal series, 3 games to 2, and could advance to the next round with a win here tonight.

Although Michael Cooper’s game-winning shot with 7 seconds left in the Lakers’ 111-109 Game 5 win may indeed have been a death rattle for Utah, Malone and his Jazz teammates heard a different tune. To them, the Lakers--on their own court, with a houseful of celebrities and a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter--still were behind by a point with 12 seconds remaining and needed Cooper to bail them out.

Back in the Salt Palace, where the teams split Games 3 and 4, that may not be enough, Malone said.

“I’m really, really in a good state of mind because that was the best they can play, the best I’ve ever seen them play, and we were still up by 1,” Malone said. “They needed a miracle. How many miracles have they got?

“I know how they’re thinking. Everybody counted us out. People already got the Boston-Laker caps and shirts made. That’s interesting, but it’s not over yet.

“I’ll tell you what--they’ve got to beat us, and they haven’t done it yet.”

So what we have here are dueling guarantees--Coach Pat Riley’s promise that the Lakers will repeat as National Basketball Assn. champions, Malone’s that they’re not going to get out of Utah with the win that would take them one more step toward that goal. And Malone already has backed up one guarantee: In the first round, after the Jazz split two games in Portland, Malone swore that the Jazz would win the next two at home to eliminate the Trail Blazers. He delivered on time.

“I’ve just been looking at each player they’ve got and each player we’ve got,” Malone said. “Point guard to point guard, shooting guard to shooting guard, center to center, forwards to forwards.

“How far are we behind, if we’re behind at all? Not far at all.”

What Jazz player could have dared say that after losing a 110-91 laugher to the Lakers in Game 1?

Said guard Bobby Hansen: “After that game we said, ‘Wait a minute. That can’t be the Utah Jazz the way we want to be remembered as. Let’s go out fighting.’

“We were reading all those one-liners in the L.A. papers. It gets you so enraged. We couldn’t even go out wearing a Jazz T-shirt. That’s changed now.”

And the Jazz wonder if the outcome of Tuesday night’s game might have been changed if 7-foot 4-inch center Mark Eaton hadn’t fouled out with more than half of the fourth quarter still to be played.

Utah Coach Frank Layden was so afraid he’d say something bad about the officiating--not one foul was called against the Lakers in the third quarter--that he closed the Jazz dressing room to the media after the game. That earned the Utah franchise a hefty fine, as team President David Checketts learned after talking with the league office Wednesday morning.

“I was just standing there like this, and (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) stumbles out of bounds,” Eaton said, describing his fifth personal foul, which he got with 7 minutes 24 seconds left to play. “And how about the shot that Mychal Thompson took, which hit the bottom of the backboard, and I was standing there with my hands up?

“To beat the Lakers at the Forum, you’ve got to be ahead by 10 or 12 points with a couple of minutes to go, because everything in the last couple of minutes is going to go their way.

“It’s a reality.”

Utah’s John Stockton, meanwhile, has been something just short of unreal in this series. In eclipsing another pretty good point guard, one Earvin Johnson, Stockton tied Johnson’s playoff record for assists with 24, scored 23 points and made 5 steals, including 2 in the last 2 minutes. He also got his hand on the ball just before Magic dumped it off to Cooper for the game-winning shot.

Asked if he could take satisfaction in playing a starring role in what Laker General Manager Jerry West called one of the greatest games he’d ever seen, Stockton said: “You can find satisfaction in anything if you want to. The world’s full of satisfied losers. The thing that matters is where you choose to draw the line at what you’re satisfied with.

“This is the playoffs. You can throw out all the stats, you can throw the season out the window; nothing else matters. It comes down to whether you win or lose--who cares what your numbers were?”

For the same reason, Stockton said, the Jazz ironmen are ignoring the incredible number of minutes they’re logging. Stockton, Malone and Hansen all played the full 48 minutes Tuesday night; Thurl Bailey played 44 and never sat down after entering the game.

“We’ll play as long as we have to, as long as the coach asks us,” Stockton said.

The Lakers are hopeful that Stockton and Co. won’t have to play beyond tonight, but Malone has different ideas.

“I’ve got an inner feeling, an inner side of Karl Malone that no one ever saw, that tells me we’re going back,” Malone said. “I’m definitely looking forward to going back.

“I have some people back in L.A., but that’s not why I’m going back. I wish we were playing (Wednesday). How can you get tired in the playoffs?

“Tired is mental. If nothing else, we’ll play for the stars that come out. I saw O.J. (Simpson), I saw Dyan (Cannon)--she’s unbelievable, jumping up and down--I saw Billy Crystal and Mel Gibson, I saw Shirelle.

“If nothing else makes you play, play for them.”

Laker Notes

Utah Coach Frank Layden, who barred reporters from Utah’s dressing room following a 111-109 loss in Game 5 Tuesday night, said he feared he would go off on the officials in his postgame comments. Layden was especially angry that not a single foul was called on the Lakers in the third quarter, although the Jazz wound up shooting 31 free throws to the Lakers’ 19. A regular-season tirade by Layden cost the franchise a $10,000 fine, and Utah President David Checketts said the team faces a similar fine for Layden’s decision to ban the media. “I don’t know if we can win this thing--we probably can’t,” Layden told reporters in his office Wednesday. “But if we lose it, we want to lose it on the court. I was hot about having Mark Eaton on the bench in the last two games.” Eaton got in early foul trouble in Game 4 and fouled out of Game 5. Both games were won by the Lakers.

Checketts spoke by phone to NBA Executive Vice President Russell Granik, adding that Commissioner David Stern was present in Granik’s office during the call. “What the league did was call and say, ‘We want to hear from you that this will never happen again,’ ” Checketts said. “ ‘If you can’t give us that assurance, it will affect the amount of the fine.’ I said, ‘OK, it will never happen again.’ ” . . . Checketts, who remained in Salt Lake City to attend to his seriously ill father, said he would have advised Layden to act differently if he’d been present. Asked if he backed his coach, Checketts said: “I’ll tell you what I told our owner (Larry Miller): ‘You’re not going to change him, so you have to accept the package the way it is. I judge based on results, and we’ve had the best year we’ve ever had in our history. And Frank has had an awful lot to do with that. The organization is in support of Frank.” . . . Checketts wondered why the Lakers didn’t hear from the league office after Pat Riley claimed that there were 21 illegal defenses not called in Game 2. “That’s the same thing we got hammered for earlier in the year,” Checketts said. “You talk about protecting the integrity of the league--isn’t that attacking the officials?”

Did anyone notice that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar didn’t shoot much better in Game 5 (5 of 13) than he did in Games 2 and 3 (3 of 13, 3 of 14)? He also had as many turnovers (5) as he did baskets. The Laker center did, however, make a couple of big defensive plays and also stood in and took a charge from Karl Malone. “I hope he takes a few more charges,” Malone said. . . . Add Game 5: Mychal Thompson played a big role in the Laker win. He had 18 points on 7 of 9 shooting, and grabbed 11 rebounds, 7 on the offensive boards, in 26 minutes. . . . Kurt Rambis, a starter until Sunday, had his minutes dwindle to 3 Tuesday night. Rambis was scoreless but had 2 rebounds. . . . The Lakers did not work out Wednesday.