He Calls ‘Em Jackals but He Can’t Hide

The Western Conference finals progressed on schedule Wednesday, with the Portland Trail Blazers waking to find Phil Jackson’s “jackals” comment at the top of the sports section of the Oregonian newspaper and the targets themselves equally predictable in response.

“That’s Phil,” guard Steve Smith said.

Jackson, the Laker coach, had already tweaked entire cities this season (Orlando is plastic, Sacramento is not entirely civilized) and lobbed grenades at the monumental moment for an organization (the San Antonio Spurs’ 1999 NBA title should have an asterisk because of the shortened season), so this was a glancing blow by comparison. This being the critical time of a critical series, though, it didn’t go unnoticed, as if it took a dig in a 1-1 tie against the hated ones to rally the troops.

So Jackson said Tuesday that “What we remember is the attitude that Portland carried off the floor [Monday]” and “They were kind of jackals down there on the bench” and that the Lakers will remember those things when they come to Portland for Game 3 on Friday and that Scottie Pippen should be called for illegal defense more often because of the way he cheats off his man and roams. And the Trail Blazers, dutifully prodded by the media on Wednesday for a response, returned fire.

“It was an interesting thought,” Coach Mike Dunleavy said. “Any team that gets a win on the road is going to be happy about it. We can’t all sit stoically like he does and not react to things. Our guys were up, showing a positive emotion. I don’t think it was an over-celebration on our part in any way. We know and we understand what is at hand.

“And the other comment, about the illegal defenses, I know exactly the play he’s talking about. He’s right. Probably Scottie was illegal on it. Unfortunately, they [officials] didn’t call it. He was guarding [Glen] Rice and Rice drilled a jumper on us. But if they want to make it retroactive, I’ll be willing to call all our illegal defenses against us and call all of [Shaquille O’Neal’s] against him and let’s shoot it off after the game. That’s fine by me.”

Said Smith: “Celebrating? All we did was walk off the court.”

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Antonio Harvey, the former Laker discovery out of tiny Pfeiffer College, played 19 games in a reserve role for the Trail Blazers, before being left off the playoff roster. But he still accompanied the team to Staples Center for the start of the series, a thrill.

“Yeah, it is kind of weird,” said Harvey, who was undrafted in 1993 out of the tiny NAIA school but started as a rookie on opening night and spent two seasons with the Lakers. “This [Portland] is my team and I’m 100% loyal to the team I’m with. But it’s still kind of nostalgic seeing Jerry [West] and Mitch [Kupchak] and those guys and thinking about how it was, how much fun it was.”