As Nick Goes, So Go the Lakers

Nick Van Exel doesn’t dribble the basketball when he’s racing downcourt so much as he manages to keep it from flying away. The ball always seems to be at the edge of his control, like a toy in the outstretched paw of a cat.

His layups take an agonizingly long time to get to the basket. They hang and float, keeping you in suspense before finally dropping through the net.

That’s the way it is with Van Exel: You never can be sure.

What’s going on in that shaved head of his or how that chronically sore knee is feeling are anybody’s guess.

The only certainty is that Van Exel holds the key to the Lakers’ hopes. He’s their best player in the clutch, and his performance will determine how long their postseason lasts and whether they hang another championship banner in the Forum.

Everything else is starting to fall into place, fitting into a comfortable pattern. When Shaquille O’Neal is in the lineup you can count on him for 27 points and 12 rebounds. Kobe Bryant will do something spectacular, something ill-advised, and find a way to get 17 points. Guys like Corie Blount and Derek Fisher are developing into fine role players, fulfilling their simple tasks and not trying to do too much. Someone else, be it Eddie Jones or Rick Fox, can come up with big nights now and then.

Van Exel needs to have big nights with regularity. He can do it either by scoring or passing, but he needs to have an impact almost every night.

He has come through more often than not this season, which is why he deserves to be at the All-Star game in New York this weekend. The Lakers have the second-best record in the league, and he’s a major reason why.

Think back to the best moments of this season and they involved Van Exel. Don’t get carried away by the romp over the Chicago Bulls on Sunday, which Van Exel sat out because of a strained hip. That came at home against a road-weary team. When the Lakers first announced themselves as a major force, it was Van Exel who served notice.

The breakthrough came in back-to-back games at San Antonio and Houston in November. The Lakers had not lost a game yet, but they also had not beaten a tough opponent on the road until Van Exel pulled up for a three-pointer that brought overtime and an eventual Laker victory.

At Houston the next night, Van Exel scored 35 points, made a three-pointer to tie the score with 6.9 seconds remaining in regulation, then scored 12 of the Lakers’ 22 points in the two overtimes for another victory.

But look at some of the low points of the season and they usually coincide with Van Exel’s poorer performances: a three-for-10 shooting night in a loss to the 76ers; two for 12 on three-pointers in the Pacific Division showdown defeat in Seattle; one for nine last week against the Nets, in the team’s most lopsided home loss of the season.

The Lakers are 5-7 when he has three turnovers or more, 1-2 in the three games in which he has had four turnovers.

He’ll have off-nights occasionally, but the Lakers can’t afford them in May and June.

In their best playoff run since the 1991 NBA finals, Van Exel carried the Lakers to a 1995 first-round upset of the SuperSonics, then he made three-pointers to force overtime and then win Game 5 against the Spurs, perhaps keeping the Lakers in that series a little longer than they should have been.

Back then, he appeared poised to step up to the next echelon of stardom in the NBA. By the end of last season, he looked ready to get kicked out of L.A.

His relationship with Coach Del Harris disintegrated in full view of everyone. His shot selection was poor and his leadership nonexistent. No one--Van Exel included--expected him to be back this year.

But Jerry West has a habit of sticking with “his” guys. West also has a habit of being right.

Van Exel said he would be more mature this season, and he has been. We’ve made it to February and he has not shoved a referee or accused any of betting on games. No sideline meltdowns with Harris. No foolish claims to the Pacific Division title before it’s clinched.

His decision-making is excellent. He knows when to go to the basket himself and when to look for other teammates. His assist-to-turnover ratio is 4.68 to 1, the best in the NBA. He also ranks among the league leaders in three-point shots made.

Watch Van Exel these days and it’s obvious he knows that being a point guard is about more than just passing the ball to people. It’s about court awareness, recognizing the flow of the game, exploiting matchups.

There’s a little more understanding of how to play with O’Neal, by Van Exel and everyone else, in Shaq’s second season with the club. And Van Exel has more weapons in his arsenal than most point guards.

“I have so many players around me, I can do so many things,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about doing your thing all the time. You’ve got guys that can go out and create for themselves and get other guys shots. It makes the game a lot easier for you.”

But Van Exel never makes it easy for the rest of us. Now that he finally seems to have it together mentally, his body is weakening. The pain in his left knee won’t go away. It caused him to sit out a game last month and always threatens to flare up again.

“It hasn’t changed since the beginning of the season,” he said. “I expect it to be pain throughout. You’ve just got to deal with it.”

After his picturesque 23-point, 11-assist, no-turnover game against Portland on Wednesday night, he said he felt no pain in the knee and pronounced himself physically ready to play in his first All-Star game on Sunday.

“I feel good,” Van Exel said. “I feel real good.”

He turned and rapped his knuckles on the his wooden locker.

That’s the only approach if the Lakers are your team and Van Exel is your point guard. Knock on wood and keep your fingers crossed.