Nets Push the Lakers Around : Pro basketball: New Jersey’s physical style is credited by Pfund for its 102-90 victory.

There had been an encouraging sign from the Lakers in recent days, a hint of the possibilities ahead.

Of the playoffs? No.

Of an offense.

Then came Friday night, when the New Jersey Nets came to the Forum looking for a return to defensive form and found the Lakers willing victims. The result was the Nets holding the same team that averaged 108.3 points the previous six games and scored a season-high 129 two nights earlier to the low 80s until garbage time, when they put the finishing touches on a 102-90 victory before 12,251 at the Forum.

The Lakers scored 22, 22, 21 and 25 points against the Nets, who were coming off an uncharacteristic showing for one of Chuck Daly’s teams in getting pounded Wednesday. That fourth quarter had the Lakers at 82 points before three meaningless baskets in the final 1:11 got the Lakers to 90.

“They’re just physical,” Laker Coach Randy Pfund said. “Chuck’s teams are always physical. They just don’t let you feel comfortable. A lot of times there is bumping or banging. I’m not saying they foul all the time, but they just don’t let you feel comfortable.”

That’s the idea.

“You’re not going to win on the road unless you play great defense,” Daly said. “We had to be much more aggressive.”

Said Net Derrick Coleman, who had 25 points and 18 rebounds, both game highs: “He just told us we had to step up or else we were going to lose all three games on this road trip.”

The Lakers trailed by as much as 79-65 before closing to 82-76. The deficit was still six with five minutes remaining when the Nets pulled away for good, capitalizing on Nick Van Exel missing back-to-back three-pointers, the latter an air ball, for a 94-81 lead.

The Nets began the three-game trip 5 1/2 games ahead of Charlotte for the eighth and final Eastern Conference playoff spot, but were slipping with each day. A 132-111 loss at Sacramento on Wednesday, the most points New Jersey has given up this season, cut the lead to 4 1/2 games, then the Hornets won at home Friday before tipoff in Los Angeles.

Faced with the possibility of being only 3 1/2 games up, with a stop in Phoenix still ahead, the Nets responded by tightening their defense against the Lakers and giving up only 44 points in the first half. That, and a 10-3 rally the final 1:38, was worth a nine-point lead at halftime.

The Lakers trailed by 68-58 when Vlade Divac provided a temporary jump start, rebounding Coleman’s shot and driving the length of the court for a dunk. He then blocked a shot by Benoit Benjamin and moments later delivered a long lead pass to George Lynch that resulted in a foul and one made free throw.

That brought the Lakers within 68-61, but also marked their last points for about a minute and a half, part of a stretch of 2:25 without a field goal. By the end of the third quarter, the Nets had regained control, 75-65.

Laker Notes

Winning has done strange things for the Lakers. First, Coach Randy Pfund shakes up the routine and lets players decide what time to arrive before the last two games, but only after detailed shootarounds both afternoons that go at least two hours. Friday, Pfund, disguising his voice with a country twang, phoned Chick Hearn and his pregame call-in show as R.C. from Inglewood. “Does he know what to do when you don’t call down and tell him to call a timeout?” R.C. asked Hearn, known for his backseat coaching. Hearn said later: “I didn’t pick up his voice. He asked me how I thought he was doing. Thank God I said OK.” When Hearn finally realized it was Pfund on the line, he cracked, “Your parents are going to be ashamed of you.”

Sedale Threatt had climbed to No. 8 in the league in free-throw percentage at the start of the night, also on pace to easily break his career best of 83.3%, set in 1985-86 as a 76er.