Salt Mines

What papers in the Salt Lake City area are saying about the series:

MICHAEL C. LEWIS, THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE

“All that talk, and that’s the best the Los Angeles Lakers could do? Shoot 30% and lose by 35? Isn’t the whole premise of the NBA Western Conference finals that the teams are supposed to be good?

“Only one looked the part on Saturday.”

BRAD ROCK, THE DESERET NEWS

“The Los Angeles Lakers were still talking tough after the game, claiming they weren’t intimidated, that it was just one game, that getting squashed into an oil spot didn’t mean much. While that may be true, following the Jazz’s 35-point win on Saturday there was one nagging question that wouldn’t go away. Where were the new-and-improved, industrial strength Lakers?

“Despite the talk of maturing and growing, of coming of age, of enjoying the incredible lightness of being, the Playoff Lakers, circa 1998, are pretty much the same as the Lakers of 1997. Wasn’t that Nick Van Exel doubling his pleasure by picking up a flagrant foul and a technical in the same night? Those clangers Kobe Bryant threw off the rim? We’d recognize them anywhere. Eddie Jones was more worried about roughing up Jeff Hornacek than repeating his series against Seattle. Robert Horry? Uh . . . um . . . what number was he?

“For all the speculation that they have grown into card-carrying adults, having finally discovered the playoffs are different from the regular season, the Lakers looked strangely familiar. They were outplayed, outcoached, outpsyched. Isn’t this where we left off?”