It’s Magic Despite Ejection : Pro basketball: Johnson’s ouster sparks 128-123 overtime victory, pulling Lakers within 2 1/2 games of Nuggets.

The Laker express, Magic Johnson at the controls, got slightly sidetracked Wednesday night, but not enough to do major damage. Denver, the destination, remains in clear view.

Sacramento ripped a hole in their pride and joy, the defense that had held four consecutive opponents to fewer than 100 points, but couldn’t get anything out of it. The Kings lost that chance along with an 18-point third-quarter lead and then the game, 128-123, in overtime before 12,066 at the Forum. The Lakers pulled within 2 1/2 games of the idle Nuggets for the final Western Conference playoff spot.

The Kings, playing without the injured Lionel Simmons and Walt Williams, wasted 39 points from Mitch Richmond and 32 from Spud Webb. The Lakers were without a key component down the stretch--Johnson.

When their coach got kicked out with 2:12 left in the third quarter after getting his second technical, the Lakers used it as a spark to close the gap that led to a 113-113 score at the end of regulation. Once in overtime, they broke to an insurmountable 125-118 lead to extend the home winning streak to seven games for the first time since January of 1992 as James Worthy scored a season-high 31-points. Vlade Divac added 22 points and 14 rebounds.

The Lakers had reason to feel good coming in. The Nuggets lost to the Clippers Tuesday night on a missed layup--”I’ve never rooted for the Clippers so hard,” Johnson said--and were heading into a stretch of Seattle, the Lakers, Houston, Phoenix and San Antonio. The Lakers, meanwhile, had a last-place team that lost to Dallas the night before.

One problem. That last-place team in town was the Kings, who had already won four games in the season series for the first time since 1965-66 and were looking to join the Suns of 1992-93 as the only Western Conference teams to beat the Lakers five times in a row in a season. It wasn’t much of a rest stop after playing Seattle, Houston and Atlanta and before Friday’s showdown with Denver.

So what happened next could not have been a surprise--the Kings led by nine points at halftime after Webb’s three-pointer with three-tenths of a second left. When Richmond opened the third quarter with another three-pointer and Webb followed that with a basket, the cushion was up to 61-47.

It was 80-64 when the Lakers lost a coach and found a spark. Both came when a technical was called on Worthy, at which point Johnson went to midcourt to argue with official Ron Olesiak and got his second technical. Richmond made both free throws for an 82-64 advantage.

The crowd responded by giving Johnson a standing ovation as he headed to the locker room. The Lakers responded with an 8-2 rally in the final 2:03, capped by Sedale Threatt’s fallaway jumper at the buzzer, cutting the deficit to 84-72 heading into the final quarter.

Laker Notes

James Worthy has been sparked by his former teammate, Magic Johnson, becoming his coach. Opponents say so and the statistics bear it out. “They’ve been playing real hard,” Rocket Coach Rudy Tomjanovich said. “The guy that’s most noticeable is James Worthy. The guy’s rejuvenated. He looks young, doing the things he did earlier.” And consider this: Worthy was the leading scorer among reserves in four of the first five games under Johnson heading into Wednesday night, and he made up for that one other time by contributing seven assists. Moreover, his biggest impact has been down the stretch, shooting 51.2% overall the first five games but going a combined 16 for 25 (64%) in the second half. “I think that goes along with the general concept of the team,” Worthy said. “Any time you change gears or have a new coaching situation, it seems to create some type of freshness. As the whole team has picked up, I’m part of that.” So the change is as obvious to him as others. “I’m excited for the young guys,” he said. “I’m excited I can still contribute. I think there were some times we were not in it mentally, and that has a lot to do with how we played. Some times, we were psychologically dead.”

The Lakers put Reggie Jordan on the injured list before the game with recurring back spasms and activated Antonio Harvey, a move to get another look at Harvey before the end of the season. Harvey, the rookie forward, had made 21 appearances, including an opening-night start, before going on the injured list Feb. 24 because of a strained hip muscle and missing the next 38 games. Jordan averaged 3.8 points, 2.4 rebounds and 8.6 minutes in 19 outings after being signed out of the CBA.