Now Is the Time for One Great Coach to Come to Aid of Team

By BILL PLASCHKE

May 24, 2000 12 AM PT

In his previous life, Phil Jackson always had someone to take the ball.

In the playoffs, under pressure, the faucets dripping, the foundation cracking, the cliches bubbling, he would give it to No. 23, and Michael Jordan would make history.

But that was 1,749 miles away.

And $30 million ago.

This week, his new team backed into an alley by old demons, the ball stays put.

This week, it’s in Phil Jackson’s hands.

Under those six championship rings.

With a city’s hopes firmly, if not a tad desperately, in his grip.

This is why he was brought here.

This is why he is being paid more than any coach in Laker history to stay here.

It was never about compiling the league’s best regular-season record.

It was never about being arguably the league’s best regular-season coach.

It was never even about advancing past the first two rounds of the playoffs.

Del Harris won two rounds.

Phil Jackson was hired for more.

He was hired for now.

It’s the Western Conference finals.

His Lakers are tied with the Portland Trail Blazers at one game apiece.

But his Lakers have just lost at home for the first time this postseason.

And his Lakers are now forced to win at least one of the next two games in Portland.

That is why he is here.

To figure out how to win something they couldn’t win before.

At a time when losing is no longer an option.

Zen Master?

Right about now, he needs to be a Mend Master.

By Friday’s Game 3, Jackson needs to patch together the fragile egos that he so deftly directed during the regular season.

Where it was once about Shaquille O’Neal versus Kobe Bryant, the conflict increasingly involves the duo’s frustration at their teammates’ inability to match their nightly energy.

Jackson also needs to be a Blend Master.

With Portland placing two men around O’Neal even before he gets the ball, and sometimes two more around Bryant, Jackson needs to figure out how to get the other three starters more involved in the flow.

Monday, when four reserves played more minutes than A.C. Green or Ron Harper, was not one of those times.

Jackson could also work on being a Glen Master.

The key to both unclogging Portland’s defense and slowing its offense rests in Glen Rice, whose sore knee needs protection and whose sore shooting needs work.

How do you get into the joints of a man who says he’s aching--and therefore vulnerable to Scottie Pippen? How do you get into the head of a longtime scorer who still sometimes wonders why nobody can set any screens for him?

It’s a tough business, but Jackson was able to make it work under less difficult circumstances during the regular season.

Of course, the plumber isn’t paid for those days when everybody’s pipes are working.

Finally, Jackson needs to be a Lend Master.

That championship, knockout heart that he helped solidify all those years in Chicago? The Lakers need some of that now, and quick.

This is his most difficult task. If grown men don’t want to play all 48 minutes in some of the biggest games in their career, some big frumpy guy in glasses and sandals isn’t going to convince them.

But Jackson must try.

Considering his $6-million annual salary, the coach could look at it this way:

Friday is a $3-million game.

Sunday is a $3-million game.

“It’s about getting them prepared to be quick to the ball, getting them in tune, making them feel good about themselves,” Jackson said Tuesday.

They were none of those things a day earlier in Game 2.

Some say if the Lakers lose, it’s because they are hopelessly overmatched at important positions.

But this same roster won 67 regular-season games.

Some counter that such matchup problems, while difficult to exploit during the regular season, are magnified under the scrutiny of a seven-game series.

But so too is the ability to make adjustments, to coax wins from losses, to turn great players into championship players.

That is Jackson’s department.

He has done little wrong this season, winning over his players and charming his public.

He has also done little wrong in these playoffs, even if he and his players have been a little eccentric.

When the Lakers were pushed to a fifth and deciding game by the Sacramento Kings, instead of getting mad, he got apathetic. He shrugged and said if they couldn’t get jazzed about a game like that, they didn’t deserve to advance.

They responded with perhaps their most inspired performance of the year.

When the Lakers were embarrassed in Phoenix in the second round, he was so humiliated, he refused to address them as a team at halftime.

A couple of days later, they easily clinched the series.

The biggest complaint from folks this season is that, while Jackson seems to be a great coach, he doesn’t appear during games to actually do much coaching, often sitting for long stretches and failing to call timeouts to stop the opponent’s momentum.

This habit became a national spectacle Monday when he did not call one timeout during the Trail Blazers’ 20-0 run in the third quarter.

Jackson immediately took the blame for it, saying he waited too long to teach a lesson.

“I think a team that is going to go on the road in the playoffs and survive has to be able to right themselves,” he said Tuesday. “I completely blew that one away by not getting a timeout.”

Stuff happens. For Jackson to take any sort of hit for that embarrassing loss would be embarrassing.

But with the two biggest games of the season upon us, the situation remains obvious.

Clear the lane. Everybody to one side.

It’s Phil Jackson, one on one against something 1,749 miles away and $30 million ago.

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

GAME 3

Best-of-seven series tied, 1-1

LAKERS AT PORTLAND

6 P.M. FRIDAY, CHANNEL 4

More Coverage, Page 4

EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS

INDIANA: 102