Lakers Stay at Proper Level

The Lakers played through the least of their midseason issues Tuesday night.

That is, that they sometimes lose to lousy basketball teams. It is what it is, a competitive tic that has become more of an annoyance than anything contrary to their three-peat wishes. They typically shook their heads, took one final look at some last-place team or another dancing away, and moved on, pretty sure that was the last of it.

It kept happening though, five times in all, which led them here, to a last-place team in spirit, if not yet in reality.

The Lakers defeated the dreadful Atlanta Hawks, 127-93, at a dead Philips Arena, and they are 1-1 on a five-game trip with many miles ahead. They beat the Hawks the way they should beat a poor team, convincingly, as though the game interested them, as though their defense was worth the effort.

Kobe Bryant scored 32 points, 20 in the first quarter, in 27 minutes. Shaquille O’Neal scored 23 in 26 minutes, despite a toe malady that continues to concern club officials. They are considering plans that would keep his minutes very short at the All-Star game, or that would keep him away from the game altogether.

Meantime, huge leads--12 points in the first quarter, 28 in the second and 40 in the fourth--kept O’Neal off his feet for the final 15 minutes.

He didn’t speak to reporters after the game, a practice to which he has pretty much clung for more than two weeks.

Laker Coach Phil Jackson said O’Neal looked OK to him, and, indeed, O’Neal made 10 of 13 shots, though he barely was challenged by Nazr Mohammed and a Hawk frontcourt that lacks injured center Theo Ratliff. Again, as the Lakers did to the Hawks, O’Neal performed as he should have against the NBA’s overmatched.

When Jackson spoke before the game about a Laker slump that had become six defeats in nine games, due largely to holes in their shooting, defense and rebounding, he pointed in part to O’Neal.

“All of it revolves around Shaquille’s mobility,” Jackson had said. “His activity level right now is limited.

“It doesn’t all fall on his shoulders, [but] there are some things I’d like to see us do that we’re not able to do right now. With Shaq in the lineup we’re not able to run, we aren’t able to chase balls down as quickly. Those are things we’d like to do. And I’m going to watch him tonight, because he was tender after the game on Sunday.”

Perhaps due to O’Neal’s limitations, and definitely due to the Hawks’, Bryant went out dynamically on offense. He made 10 of 12 field-goal attempts in the first quarter, then made his first two shots in the second quarter. The Hawks tried Jacque Vaughn, Jason Terry and Ira Newble, without effect, and Bryant reached halftime with 26 points.

“I was going at them a little bit,” Bryant said. “They had a little guard [Terry] playing me, so I made it a point to post up and be a little more assertive to start the game.”

He was, at times, sensational, as he was two weeks ago, when he scored 56 points against Memphis.

“It’s almost amazing,” Laker forward Samaki Walker said, “for the simple fact guys can’t figure a way to stop him. It’s amazing. I’m searching for one way to describe it. I can’t.

“You do get caught up in watching it. It’s a show.”

The Lakers had 68 points at halftime, a season high, then 102 after three quarters, also a season high. Bryant did not play the first 7:36 of the second quarter, and the Lakers ripped off an 18-0 run, from a 32-24 lead to 50-24. They made 16 of 24 shots in the first quarter and 12 of 21 in the second, and coasted from there, with Bryant highlights sprinkled in.

“We had Kobe going tonight. I had to sit him down to stop him, really,” Jackson said, smiling a little. “He was going like crazy. And we took advantage of their small guard corps and it set a tone for the game.”

The Lakers carry their few issues like car keys. Used to be, they lugged them like anvils. Like last season, when they lost here to another abysmal Hawk team, the Lakers have had their moments of distraction. It does not appear to bother them, as they perhaps are warmed by last season’s playoff run.

Still, this business of losing to unworthy teams ...

“It wasn’t really an emphasis,” Walker said. “As men, we knew what we had to do tonight. There were no excuses for not winning this game. Not only that, there was no excuses for not beating them the way we did.”