West Denies Contacting Rick Pitino

Laker General Manager Jerry West on Monday denied a weekend report that he had contacted University of Kentucky Coach Rick Pitino about possibly replacing Randy Pfund as coach of the Lakers.

“It’s not true,” West said of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution story.

Pitino last week turned down an offer from the Atlanta Hawks to replace Bob Weiss as coach.

After a week of evaluations, club officials have said nothing about Pfund’s future, which became uncertain late in the season.

Said West: “I would assume, in my mind, nothing is going to happen. My best guess is if something is going to happen, it would have happened long ago. . . . If our owner wanted to make a change, I think I would have heard about it and I haven’t heard anything yet.”

Said Pfund: “In the natural progression of things, I’m sure we’ll talk.”