Another So-So Victory

Shaquille O’Neal limped through the locker room, a white towel stretched across his waist, another draped over his shoulders.

His feet hurt, and the Laker three-peat is months away, if it is out there at all, and maybe some days being the biggest and baddest player in the NBA--”Maybe ever,” the opposing coach had mused--is a job too.

“Nine hundred days left,” O’Neal said, and smiled.

Not yet on their game but close enough for now, the Lakers beat the Golden State Warriors, 101-85, Sunday night at Staples Center. They’ve won two in a row, this one with shrugs and head tilts, because they’re not entirely pleased with themselves, but won’t spit on 18-3, either.

They still aren’t shooting well, and, taken a game at a time, they still aren’t dynamic. But, only one Laker team has been better after 21 games--the 1985-86 team was 19-2--and they have the best record in the league. So, if the playoffs seem a long way off, with plenty of games against the likes of Golden State ahead, it is because they are, and there are, and the challenge for the Lakers is to find the energy and the interest to win them.

“It’s another win,” Laker guard Derek Fisher said. “Let’s be happy with that.”

Today, they’ll worry about the shots that won’t fall--they were three for 16 on three-point attempts, have made 31.3% this season and don’t have a player in the league’s top 40 in that category. Asked if the answer was his own players getting better and not to trade for a shooter, Coach Phil Jackson said, “I hope so.”

The Lakers cut two shooters--Mike Penberthy and Joe Crispin--in the last month because of luxury tax concerns.

While the Lakers sort that out, they continue to have O’Neal and Kobe Bryant, which often is plenty. Bryant scored 28 points, 16 of them in the third quarter. He made 10 of 12 field-goal attempts, many of them around the rim, many of them spectacularly. He played only 32 minutes, as the Lakers took a close game and outscored the Warriors by 12 points in the second half, and led by as many as 20 in the fourth quarter.

O’Neal, who complained that the arena was too cold to loosen his legs, scored 20 points and had a team-high six assists.

“It is tough, tough, tough,” Warrior power forward Danny Fortson said of defending O’Neal. “I thought that I could move him, but I guess I was wrong. I tried, but it didn’t work. Maybe it was the back-to-back [games], but I don’t know. Maybe he is just really heavy. I couldn’t budge him.”

O’Neal simply wasn’t in much mood to be budged, and Bryant was terrifically efficient, all of which was more than the teetering Warriors could bear.

“There’s nobody as big and strong as him in the NBA, maybe ever, and he’s going to get a lot of attention,” said Warrior Coach Brian Winters, in his second day on the job after Dave Cowens was fired on Saturday. “Pick your poison. You give him 40 or you line up on him and try to recover on their shooters.”

Or, watch Kobe go by.

The third quarter belonged to Bryant, and who cares if nobody’s jump shots are falling when Bryant is on the break, with nothing ahead but rim and whatever comes to him?

He made six of seven shots for those 16 points, six on dunks that enlivened a typically sedate Sunday night crowd, all during a 14-4 run that took the Laker lead to 78-65.

In order, the three dunks were two-handed hard, one-handed tomahawk, and two-handed from way behind his head, very, very hard.

The last started at about the arc, with Bobby Sura and Erick Dampier squatting before him. A cross-over dribble split them, leaving only the lane and Bryant’s imagination, and he finished with his elbows near the rim, and the crowd at his heels.

Bryant did not play the fourth quarter.

“I got a lot of easy opportunities,” he said.

Here’s how it’s going for the Warriors: At the end of the first half, the Lakers played a good 10 seconds with four players on the floor, and the Warriors couldn’t do anything with the opportunity.

Jason Richardson cried frantic things in the corner. He jumped and waved, as did the Warrior bench behind him. Larry Hughes, Golden State’s point-guard experiment, did not see/hear/recognize him. Mitch Richmond, left standing by the Laker bench after a timeout, dashed the length of the floor. As he did, Hughes missed a jumper, and Robert Horry took the rebound and was fouled, 90 feet from his basket, with 1.9 seconds remaining. He made the free throws, and the Lakers had a four-point lead at halftime.