Suns Enjoy Real Laugher Over Lakers : Pro basketball: Barkley and his buddies are too much for Pfund’s struggling squad, 132-104.

Charles Barkley laughed as he walked off the court with 43 seconds left in the third quarter, and as he came to the bench, he was met by Coach Paul Westphal. He was laughing, too.

“I have fun winning. I don’t care who we play,” Barkley said. “You’re supposed to have fun. You play basketball for a living, you should have fun.”

Barkley and the Suns had the last laugh against the Lakers on Friday, hurting them from the low post, three-point range and every point in between. In trouncing the Lakers, 132-104, before a sellout crowd of 19,023 at the America West Arena, the Suns inflicted the Lakers’ worst loss of the season in number of points and margin of defeat.

However, Barkley hastened to say his smile didn’t mean he was gloating, merely that he was enjoying the Suns’ league-leading 33rd victory and 17th in 18 home games.

“I’m a very territorial person and the Lakers aren’t in my territory,” said Barkley, who had 20 points in 29 minutes. “I don’t wish bad things upon other athletes.”

Barkley conceded the Lakers “are struggling,” an understatement Friday. Dan Majerle victimized them for 29 points, including four of six from three-point range, and Richard Dumas added 24 points as the Suns made 62% of their shots in the first quarter to pull away. Overall, Phoenix made 54.9% of its shots to dominate from the seven-minute mark on.

That explains the chuckles and giggles and grins on the Suns’ bench.

“I don’t ever want them to try to have fun at the other team’s expense, but we do enjoy each other,” Westphal said. “When you do have a lot of weapons and they don’t enjoy each other (there’s potential for discord), but we enjoy each other and that’s something that has really pleased me about this team.”

There was very little to please Laker Coach Randy Pfund, whose team is 12-12 on the road. Besides getting only four points from Sedale Threatt and seven from Byron Scott, the Lakers committed three turnovers in the waning minutes of the first quarter that turned a 24-19 Phoenix edge into a 32-21 advantage. It was 37-29 after a quarter, 68-51 at halftime and 105-76 after three quarters.

“If it’s early in the ballgame I can accept the turnovers,” said A.C. Green, who tied a season high with 15 rebounds and had 20 points to lead the Lakers in scoring for the second night in a row. “That means you’re trying to make things happen. You make a few bad decisions when you want to push the ball upcourt fast. But when you keep doing it, that’s when it hurts. You shoot yourself in the foot too much, and before you know it, you don’t have any feet left.”

If that doesn’t make much sense, attribute it to the Lakers’ being stunned by the Suns.

“I think we got a first-hand look tonight at why that team is the best team in the league,” Pfund said. “Paul Westphal has done a great job with them, having them play both ends of the court. You’ve got to give them a lot of credit. They’ve been very tough at home and they play with a lot of confidence. They enjoy themselves, they’re loose and you see them laughing. That’s the sign of a team that feels real loose about itself.

“If there was an easy way to play the Phoenix Suns, somebody would have figured it out by now. First, you’ve got to catch them. If you double-team Barkley, you give up open three-pointers. If you let Dumas and Barkley go up against your people in the post, that can cause a lot of problems, too. We got beat tonight by a very good team.”

Laker Notes

James Edwards and Tony Smith played after sitting out the Lakers’ 114-110 victory over Utah on Thursday. Smith, who did not get off the bench in two of the Lakers’ previous four games, had four points in five minutes and Edwards had eight in eight minutes. Pfund said he hasn’t reduced his rotation to 10 players, but he acknowledged the two have been squeezed out. “There are nights right now where I could go to James ahead of Elden (Campbell) or with Elden, but I felt there was a period of time Elden was not getting into the floor enough for us and I wanted him out there,” Pfund said. “Sometimes that’s at the expense of James Edwards. I’m in no way down on either of those players.”

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