Talk Is Cheap (Shots) on the Eve of Game 7

They dialed up the rhetoric on the Western Conference finals even more Saturday, with the Portland Trail Blazers accusing the Lakers in general of cheap shots and Rick Fox in particular of thugging up Game 6.

Neither side stepped back in the name of calmer heads in a family reunion gone bad.

What started with Phil Jackson’s “jackal” jab at the Trail Blazers after Game 2 had escalated into pointed comments from both teams some 24 hours before tip-off to decide who will face the Indiana Pacers in the NBA finals that begin Wednesday. By then, Reggie Miller might seem a mute in comparison.

Tensions that were bumped up a notch Friday night at the Rose Garden--Fox and Scottie Pippen got into an altercation, and Fox and Portland Coach Mike Dunleavy jawed, and Shaquille O’Neal dropped a forearm across Pippen’s head in a flagrant foul--continued Saturday. The series moved to Los Angeles, for final practices before the climactic Game 7 today, and none of the baggage got lost en route.

Not even the guillotine.

“I’m sure Phil has already told them ‘The only way you’re going to beat this team is to cut their heads off,’ ” said Pippen, the Trail Blazer forward who played for Jackson’s Chicago Bulls. “I’m the head and they need to cut me off. That’s his philosophy and that’s just how he’s telling them to go out. They’ve tried it all series and it hasn’t worked. I’m sure tomorrow, they’re going to try to come out and complete their mission, but my mind-set is just go out and play and stay focused on what I got to do in the game and allow the officials to take care of all the other stuff that’s going on.

“They [the Lakers] have been doing that all series. It wasn’t just what you saw in [Friday’s] game. The frustration started to show a little bit more, but they’ve been giving us hard fouls the whole series and banging guys after the whistle throughout this whole battle.

“Mike [Dunleavy] doesn’t really get too angry. I think he was just trying to get the officials to recognize that Rick Fox was out there just to disrupt the game. His play hasn’t been a factor throughout the whole playoffs. He’s showing frustration not just through this series but what he’s been able to bring to his ballclub.”

Said Dunleavy, the former Laker coach: “As far as I’m concerned, I felt throughout the game that Rick came in with a purpose, and his purpose was to try and fight, take hard fouls, put a little bit more into them. And for them, if he can do it and get away with it and get some results for them, then it’s a success.”

Fox, assessed a technical along with Dunleavy late in the Trail Blazers’ 103-93 victory, was not talking Saturday. That put him in the minority.

The Trail Blazers were mad at Laker tactics. The Lakers were mad the Trail Blazers would make such an accusation.

Said Jackson: “If Scottie’s going to come hard at us, we’re going to come hard at him. And same with Bonzi Wells and the rest of them. If they’re going to come hard to the basket, we’ve got to stop penetration.”