Bryant Won’t Get Much Sympathy

The Indiana Pacers made it clear how they felt about the ankle injury suffered by the Lakers’ Kobe Bryant in Game 2. Their position? Bryant is a good player, but they wished it was Shaquille O’Neal who was hurt instead.

“They would be the same team with four reporters playing for them as long as they have Shaq in the paint,” swingman Jalen Rose said about the Lakers Saturday before the Pacers’ practice at Conseco Fieldhouse.

“We’re still going to prepare as if [Bryant] is going to play but they’ve played without Kobe before as well as not playing with Shaq,” guard Reggie Miller said. “There’s a difference. So it really doesn’t mean anything if [Bryant] is playing or not.”

While the Pacers are uncertain about Bryant’s status, they know O’Neal has been a big pain in the first two games. With 83 points in the series, O’Neal has made life miserable for center Rik Smits, who has been hampered because of foul trouble.

Smits has 11 fouls in 36 minutes against O’Neal and has scored only 16 points.

“I think the whistles have been fair,” Smits said. “There’s always some questionable calls in every game. But I don’t have a problem with the officiating.”

Smits said Indiana has to continue to be aggressive with its double-teams on O’Neal.

“I don’t know if we’re going to have Shaq on the [free-throw] line as much as we did [Friday night], but I think we need to keep doing it, especially when he gets the ball down low,” Smits said.

Indiana Coach Larry Bird did not expect Smits to stop O’Neal by himself, but he did hope his center would be more offensive-minded.

“Rik is turning down shots,” Bird said. “He’s got to play his type of game. He’s going down low, then he’s backing away. He has a tendency to drift out on the court, we need more from him.”

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Bird acknowledges he does not like the Hack-a-Shaq tactic but said the Pacers will not rule it out if O’Neal continues to miss free throws.

“I don’t know [if Indiana] will use it again. . . . You know I would rather play him straight up and play strong basketball,” Bird said. “But if you have to foul him in order to get that extra possession, you have to do it.”

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First Sacramento did it. Then Phoenix, followed by Portland. Now it’s Indiana’s turn to posture for calls against the Lakers.

The Pacers claim O’Neal spends too much time underneath the basket on both ends of the court without being called for a three-second violation or an illegal defense violation. Indiana also claims O’Neal has avoided major foul trouble despite being the most physical player on the court.

“To be honest, it’s frustrating when the game is not called the way it is,” Rose said. “I’ve never been a believer of whoever it is means a foul or it’s not three seconds. . . . Calls should be made regardless of who the player is.”

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If Bryant doesn’t play, the Pacers know that they cannot allow players like Glen Rice and Ron Harper to score like they did in Game 2.

“We kind of let some things slip, especially when Kobe went out,” point guard Travis Best said. “We should have taken advantage of that a little bit more and keyed in on the players we knew would probably step up. . . . We know Shaq is going to get his points, but we can’t let Glen and Ron Harper score like they did.”

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After struggling to get easy points in Los Angeles, the Pacers understand they’ll have to do better when it comes to offensive rebounds.

“We’re pretty much a perimeter-shooting team,” Derrick McKey said. “A lot of times, we’ll have four guys on the perimeter and one guy under for offensive rebounds. When you have that you’re not going to get a whole lot of offensive rebounds.”

To offset this, Indiana will be looking to run more at Conseco.

“We have to be able to get the ball out,” McKey said. “I think the Lakers are a team that can be ran on. We have to just get the ball up the court and play off that. . . . We can’t always be setting up and running sets all the time. . . . We have to get some early offense before their defense gets set.”