No Sweet Dreams for Shaq but MVP’s Evening Is Fine

This was on no sleep, Shaquille O’Neal said. None at all, after staying awake all Tuesday night/Wednesday morning, clear through to tipoff against the Phoenix Suns at Staples Center. Nothing but television and cereal. So help him, Fred Hickman.

Maybe it was the excitement. He couldn’t say for sure. O’Neal had, after all, been named the NBA most valuable player on Tuesday afternoon, a foregone conclusion, yes, but still a tax on his time, and then had the pregame ceremony to accept the trophy from Commissioner David Stern.

“Just couldn’t sleep,” he said.

A distraction? No. He was sure in the aftermath of the 97-96 victory over the Phoenix Suns, and the 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven Western Conference semifinals, that the moment had not taken his focus away from the momentum.

That left one explanation. Because this is what O’Neal did all season, Wednesday night being only the latest affirmation to the award that came in near-unanimous proportion. That dominating has been the norm.

A game-high 38 points. A game-high 20 rebounds, 11 more than anyone else, even as the Suns won the battle of the boards overall, 43-37. Five blocked shots, four more than all of the Suns.

The heroics belonged to Kobe Bryant. The night belonged to Shaquille O’Neal.

“This is Shaq’s game,” Laker Coach Phil Jackson said. “He controlled this game. He controlled the energy of this game.”

Good timing, perhaps. Imagine: winning the award, being presented with the award, being saluted by the home crowd with a long standing ovation . . . and then playing a bad game. In a loss at home.

It became a moot point because of O’Neal and, eventually, Bryant, who “saved us,” O’Neal said.

“I don’t believe in if’s,” O’Neal said when asked if he could have imagined the bad turn of events. “ . . . If that would have happened, we just would have had to get one there [Phoenix]. We still have to get one there.

“It wasn’t a distraction to me. I thought I had a pretty solid game. Team-wise, we had a pretty sloppy game.”

It didn’t come without bad moments for O’Neal, either. The Suns, throwing a late scare into the Lakers, went to the Hack-a-Shaq in the fourth quarter, with good results.

The ball went into O’Neal in the post.

Luc Longley fouled him immediately, before O’Neal came close to making a move to the basket.

Then O’Neal missed both free throws.

Of course, it also turned out to be the biggest contribution from Longley, O’Neal’s counterpart, but hardly close to a countermeasure. Longley, Jackson’s former center with the championship Chicago Bulls, missed nine of 11 shots and finished with four points, four rebounds and five fouls in 32 minutes.

Not a good night. Obviously.

“You think?” Phoenix Coach Scott Skiles said curtly.

Tough not to.

O’Neal went six for 14 from the line. But he was also 16 for 28 from the field.

MVP-type numbers. You think?