Lakers in a Three-Fall

Thankfully, mercifully, the audition is nearly finished.

Kurt Rambis coughed, blushed and stumbled. He sometimes lost his cues, forgot his lines, even froze.

Everybody in this town was cheering for him, everybody wanted him to break a leg.

Instead, his Lakers broke our hearts.

If they lose one more game in these Western Conference semifinals--and history says they will after Saturday’s 103-91 loss to the San Antonio Spurs--then it is reasonable to expect that Rambis should not be rehired to coach them.

The Lakers trail the Spurs, three games to none, a deficit that has never been overcome in NBA history.

Rambis is coming off two embarrassingly confusing last-minute losses, a deficit that has never been overcome in the history of interim Laker coaches.

You remember Game 2, where Rambis failed to explicitly order his team to foul Tim Duncan before Duncan sank the winning basket, after which the Lakers staggered through a play that didn’t exist?

Saturday’s finish, while not as humiliating, was actually more painful because it lasted longer.

While Game 2 was a quickly pulled tooth, this was a root canal.

Rambis works hard, knows the game, and one day could make a great boss, maybe even here. But, unfair as it may be, the timing is not right.

Imagine beginning your head coaching career on the team with Dennis Rodman and an absent vice president, with feuding stars and a short season, all amid expectations of a championship.

Of Kurt Rambis, it has been too much to ask.

Never has this been more evident than Saturday with 2:56 remaining, and the Lakers leading, 88-86.

Admittedly, Rambis probably knows more basketball than any of the 17,505 Forum fans combined.

But did it look to anybody else out there that during those final 2:56, the Lakers didn’t run one organized play?

That they had no idea what they were doing?

That you and four of your buddies drawing formations on your hand could have done just as well?

While the Spurs didn’t say it exactly, they were thinking the same thing.

“I don’t think the Lakers really know what they want to do,” Jerome Kersey said. “It’s like they didn’t have anything set.”

And while there are many ways you could point your fingers here, this is officially the fault of Kurt Rambis.

The madness started when Robert Horry took the ball 25 feet from the basket, and held it, and held it, and held it . . . and finally passed to Shaquille O’Neal.

Who was standing at the three-point line.

Who promptly threw it behind his head to a stunned Glen Rice.

Who promptly threw it away.

That was the Lakers’ answer after the Spurs tied the score at 88 with Avery Johnson’s jump shot. San Antonio took the lead on Tim Duncan’s driving layup.

“It’s like, they were all grabbing for the ball, then one guy just gets it and holds it and looks for other guys,” Kersey said. “I know when we do that, when one of us holds the ball like that, we’re not any good.”

After Horry and Jaren Jackson countered with respective three-point baskets--keeping the Spurs in the lead, 93-91--the Lakers unveiled another unusual play.

Derek Fisher came down and threw up an off-balance three-point attempt barely moments into the 24-second shot clock,

“Some quick shots hurt us . . . throughout the game,” Rambis said.

The Spurs took a four-point lead when Johnson made a jump shot at the end of a possession that included several passes.

The Lakers then answered with a possession that ended with Rice needing to pass, but instead throwing up a wild jump shot with Sean Elliott in his face.

The ball bounced over the backboard.

But Duncan dribbled the ball off his leg, giving the Lakers one more chance to cut that four-point lead with 42.3 seconds left.

Their answer? There was none. There was only a trail of question marks trailing Kobe Bryant as he took the in-bounds pass, dribbled across midcourt, down into the corner . . . and lost the ball out of bounds.

It is sadly ironic that perhaps the last meaningful play of ultimate teammate Kurt Rambis’ coaching career here was one of his guys hogging the ball.

“I thought Kobe should have set it up a little bit,” the Spurs’ Mario Elie said. “Every player in the media guide knows you should set it up.”

In that last 2:56, not once did the Spurs fail to set it up.

During that time, they outscored the Lakers, 14-3.

“It’s a pretty simple game,” Kersey said. “You just got to play together.”

The players did that for Rambis once. So relieved that management installed their choice to replace Del Harris on Feb. 24, they won his first nine games for him.

Turns out, it was the worst thing that could have happened.

Rambis began trusting them to always play hard and play smart and play together. After all, coaches could always trust Kurt Rambis.

But, of course, these players aren’t the players of his era. They would not be caught dead wearing horn-rimmed glasses. They needed as much hammering as stroking. As much teaching as preaching.

And they needed more than a rookie coach could give.

Next season, they will need the same types of things.

It was fun, at times, these last three months. We all wanted Kurt Rambis to succeed.

But it is time for the Lakers to politely thank him for his time. And loudly shout, “Next!”

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Bill Plaschke can be reached at his e-mail address: bill.plaschke@latimes.com.