Lakers Fall Before They Are Legends

Their air of invincibility having been punctured at the start of the trip, the Lakers gave cause at the end of it to examine the foundation, the very attitude that had propelled them to the 11-0 opening. Whether they found any genuine cracks Friday night depends on the player queried, but there was no debating they had stumbled on something.

Trouble.

The Philadelphia 76ers, Larry Brown’s latest reclamation project, cut to the heart of the NBA’s exclamation project, handing the Lakers what will either serve as a reality check or a reminder, just as the favorites were telling the world with pride they did not need one.

But one may have come just the same, a 105-95 defeat before 20,714 at the CoreStates Center as Allen Iverson scored 31 points and Eric Montross--Eric Montross?--led a thrashing on the boards.

The Eastern swing ended at 1-2, the loss at Miami on Tuesday having ended the winning streak, and also ended talk of the Lakers’ great start. In its place went a conversation piece that made the rounds in a time long ago, like last season. Something along the lines of relating to the common folk a little too well--of losing to struggling teams and regretting it later in a big way.

It was Friday. It was 1996-97.

“Big head,” Eddie Jones said. Big fall.

“Thinking we can go in and beat anybody,” Jones said. “Not really thinking about the team we’re playing.

“Whew. I don’t know how we played that bad. They’re an all-right team. But we played real bad. . . . We didn’t play up to our level at all in any of these games. We let teams stay around. We can’t play like that.”

At least not while still claiming to be absolved. This is the same team, after all, that had done such a commendable job of steamrollering all those who were supposed to be under the wheels, with a couple of exceptions that immediately would be erased by another rout. It was a root of the new pride, the new attitude that not only would the Lakers get up for the contenders but for the stragglers.

Some Lakers made the argument that that was not the problem against this opponent that came in 3-8. The 76ers were not being overlooked. Well, at least not once they provided enough of a prodding by leading early in the third quarter.

But something must explain Montross, who began the night averaging 3.1 rebounds, getting 12, five more than counterpart Elden Campbell even though Montross played seven fewer minutes. Or Philadelphia, usually terrible on the boards, beating the Lakers, 51-35, including 18-9 on the offensive end.

“We’re not overconfident,” Rick Fox said. “We’re a very confident team. But that record over there does not reflect their team.”

The 76ers’ record and the 76ers’ team. “It’s not like they’ve got a sorry team over there,” Robert Horry added. “One bad night, that’s going to happen. It happened tonight.”

It happened mostly down the stretch, another blow to Laker pride. They were down only six points with five minutes left, had the confidence and inspiration of a string of fourth-quarter victories in the back pocket, and then got blitzed by a team that hadn’t scored more than 97 points in any of the three previous games.

This time the 76ers led by nine with 5:26 remaining. The Lakers took the first step on their planned comeback when Horry hit a three-pointer, but Philadelphia answered that with a 9-1 rally, making it 101-87 with 2:40 left.

Iverson got 10 of his points in the decisive final period, countering the 12 by Kobe Bryant over the same stretch in his annual return to his hometown. A crowd favorite, Bryant finished with 19 points, but Iverson and the 76ers won over the crowd in the end.

“Iverson played great tonight and he was really hard to contain,” Laker guard Nick Van Exel said. “We did not play our game, and it’s a big difference without Shaq in the middle. . . . They just beat us, and we were flat-out sluggish.”

On the other hand, at least they were done with the week. The same week that included two losses in three games, after no losses in 11 games, was easy to dissect.

“Different than the first three,” Fox said.