Van Exel Gets OK Despite Bad Knee

Nick Van Exel, who heard clicking in his troublesome left knee Sunday, missed practice for an MRI exam Tuesday but it revealed nothing. He is expected to play tonight at Phoenix.

Van Exel has missed three games, resting the knee. Since the break, he is 13 for 42 from the field, including Sunday’s 0 for nine. In the same stretch, Eddie Jones, coming off flu, missed 18 of 23 shots and the Lakers went 1-3.

Van Exel blamed himself for the loss to the Rockets but Coach Del Harris notes he has had help.

“It’s certainly not Nick’s fault that we lost the game,” Harris said. “I think it’s a healthy sign when anyone, particularly a player, takes responsibility, but it certainly wasn’t Nick’s fault we lost the game.”

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Friday, Seattle power forward Vin Baker scored 33 points and local talk-show callers began chanting Elden Campbell’s name, as if he were an NFL backup quarterback.

Sunday Campbell had 13 points with nine rebounds off the bench. Harris says if he keeps that up, he’ll get more time at his old position, rather than just being relegated to backup center.

“Elden had a slump period of time,” said Harris, “and so I went with the smaller people at the power forward like Mario [Bennett] and Corie [Blount] and Robert [Horry] . . . partly to make a point to Elden . . . All this time, I kept letting him play, anyway. So I just felt that he had to decide if he wanted to be the power forward again. That if so, he would have to do certain things.

“He practiced very well today, ran the court. That’s all that I’m asking of him, when he plays forward that he runs and plays like a forward.”

pichar

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How to sum up the Laker reaction to the Utah-Orlando trade, sending Rony Seikaly to the Jazz for Greg Foster and Chris Morris? Shock? Anger? Betrayal?

“There’s no question they [Jazz] made a good deal,” Harris said. “Originally, I heard it was for [Greg] Ostertag. I thought that made some sense for everybody.

“Should Utah be better with Rony Seikaly than a guy [Morris] that the coach had to get the police to get him off the bench one time, and a guy [Foster] they don’t use much? It sounds like a pretty good deal.”

Tonight at Phoenix

* 6

* Ch. 9

Site--America West Arena.

Radio--KLAC (570), KWKW (1330).

Records--Lakers 35-14, Suns 33-16.

Record vs. Suns--1-0.

Update--Harris, on the surprising Suns, who have the league’s seventh-best record: “In preseason they beat us and I told everybody then, I said this team’s going to be for real. They’re just so hard to defend and they’ve had five guys [Jason Kidd, Kevin Johnson, Cliff Robinson, Danny Manning, Cedric Ceballos] who’ve played in the All-Star game . . . And then you have an emerging star potential in [Antonio] McDyess. I think Steve Nash is one of the best-kept secrets in basketball. This guy can really play. They don’t have a bad player on their team.”