Fox Gives Lakers a Big Finish

Shaquille O’Neal lowered his shoulder and Kobe Bryant did his Quidditch thing, and so often that’s enough to carry the Lakers.

The three-peat effort felt its first tremor before the season saw its third weekend, both in its initial defeat and controversy, and the Sacramento Kings came in Sunday night all hopped up on themselves, even without Chris Webber.

So, the Lakers required something else familiar, something more than O’Neal and Bryant.

You remember Rick Fox. Bright guy. Decent J. Last known residence: Peja Stojakovic’s head.

Just when everyone needed the help, Fox brought his season’s most spirited half of basketball, and the Lakers defeated the Kings, 93-85, at Staples Center. O’Neal had 28 points and 15 rebounds, and Bryant scored 29 points, 13 in the fourth quarter.

Fox brought the third option, however, along with the end-to-end pressure that helped break the Kings.

From the Lakers’ nine-point halftime deficit, and a personal one-for-seven, two-point first half that contributed to it, Fox in the second half had 14 points, seven rebounds, seven assists, two steals and at least that many fist pumps.

The Kings--Pacific Division and annual playoff foes--always seem to sharpen things for the Lakers, and Fox in particular. The Lakers are 18-5 in the past six years of the series, not including the playoff sweep last spring.

In Sunday’s second half, the Lakers outscored them, 58-41. From a seven-point deficit with less than 10 minutes left, the Lakers outscored them, 25-10.

Just when it looked like the Lakers might never hit another jumper, Fox gave in. He went to the rim, looked for O’Neal, settled for layups.

Fox remembered thinking at halftime, “Something’s got to be around the corner sooner or later.”

He finished with 16 points and nine rebounds, both season highs. This on the heels of Friday’s game in Phoenix, where he did not score in 22 minutes, and the game before that in Houston, where he was two for nine from the field, and the game before that against Orlando, when he was one for eight.

“I wanted to start the season with the mind-set of doing the little things,” Fox said. “In the midst of all that, I forgot how to shoot.”

The Laker games came, finally, after halftime.

Their shots came, finally, when they stopped taking them, when they pushed the ball into the lane, into O’Neal.

The Lakers hadn’t made as many as half of their field-goal attempts in a quarter since the first on Friday night in Phoenix.

From the second quarter against the Suns through halftime Sunday, the Lakers missed 70 of their 105 shots. That’s why they lost to the very mediocre Suns, and that’s why they trailed, 44-35, at halftime Sunday.

They made 12 of 22 in the third quarter against the Kings. O’Neal made four of five attempts and Fox, who has hit a lot of rims for the better part of three weeks, went inside. He had 10 points, four assists and two steals in the third quarter, when the Lakers cut their deficit to four points. Fortunately for the Lakers, the Kings clanked all but one of 19 three-point attempts. While Stojakovic had 25 points this time, King guards Doug Christie and Mike Bibby were a combined seven for 26, including zero for eight from the arc.

Said King Coach Rick Adelman of the long-distance misses: “Sooner or later we could have figured out and stepped in and shot a two or drove to the basket. That was one thing I was disappointed in--we didn’t attack the basket in the second half. We could have done that tonight.”

Maybe they could have gone harder at O’Neal, but maybe that would have been a mistake.

O’Neal looked spry, as he did against Phoenix. While Phil Jackson has said he’d be willing to wait for O’Neal’s conditioning to come along, O’Neal seems to be showing it’s coming fast. He had something left at the end in Phoenix, when few others did, and the Lakers rode him in Sunday’s dismal first half.

“He attributed it to a day off [Saturday],” said Fox, speaking for O’Neal, who left without commenting. “Anytime Shaq’s a little perturbed, he comes out with lots of energy. He doesn’t like Sacramento, and their middle was kind of soft.”