Home May Not Be Where Heart Is

Barely a week ago, Shaquille O’Neal lay on a massage table that had been unfolded in the bathroom of a visitors’ locker room.

At that moment, the Lakers were gaining in the Western Conference, seemingly about to overtake the Minnesota Timberwolves and, perhaps, the Portland Trail Blazers.

“We’re that close?” he asked, then called out to Kobe Bryant.

“Bro,” he said, “we can get fourth. Let’s get crib-court advantage. CCA. OK?”

“All right,” Bryant said.

They touched fists, sealing the home-court oath. Three hours later, they had lost to the Seattle SuperSonics by 21 points, proving again that they’d like an early playoff advantage, but aren’t willing to, you know, die for it.

Standing on the brink of a week during which they will play the Dallas Mavericks tonight at Staples Center, the Sacramento Kings at Staples on Thursday and the Trail Blazers on Sunday in Portland, the Lakers maintained their usual what-do-we-care posture. They have won 24 consecutive home games against the Mavericks, and they’ve eliminated the Kings and the Trail Blazers in the playoffs each of the last three seasons.

They won’t sacrifice their well-being or a particularly large part of their energy for the fifth or fourth seeding in the conference playoffs, for the right to play the deciding game of any first-round series at Staples Center, where, as of Sunday night, they’d won 13 consecutive games, 12 as the home team.

It’s about their arrogance, maybe, their confidence, for sure, something 31 regular-season losses apparently haven’t changed. The Lakers have won at least one road game in all but one of the 12 playoff series they’ve played in the last three years and have a 15-2 playoff road record over the last two.

So, as Coach Phil Jackson weighs grinding versus conserving over the final five regular-season games, he’ll also have to weigh the nature of this team.

“I think where we make the adjustments as a coach,” Jackson said, “and this was what I was telling [the players] today, we slow down in practice time and off-hours shoot-arounds, little things that can wear on your legs.... The downside is, there’s a chance you lose just an amount of sharpness that creates turnovers and maybe some shooting slumps.”

Finishing sixth would draw San Antonio or Dallas. Fifth probably would get Portland or Minnesota; fourth place, either of those teams or, conceivably, Utah. In the second round, the fourth- or fifth-seeded team would get the No. 1 while Nos. 2 and 3 play each other in the bottom bracket.

From the sixth or seventh position, it is likely the Lakers would have to play through Sacramento, San Antonio and Dallas, in one order or another, to get out of the West.

“It doesn’t really matter,” Robert Horry said. “It’s just having confidence in your team. That’s what it all boils down to. You’re going to have to win on somebody else’s court.”

The Lakers know their potential opponents well, though the Mavericks least among them. Dallas has won two playoff series since 1988, while the Spurs and Kings have in common playoff elimination by the Lakers in each of the last two seasons, the Kings in the last three.

“As a group, I don’t think we can come up with a consensus as to which of the five teams that are ahead of us would be most advantageous for us,” Jackson said. “I suppose Minnesota or Portland.... But, for us, it’s not about winning the first round and then getting to the second round and extending it. It’s about going all the way to the championship.

“If we can deal with what’s right in front of us, we’ll be all right in the end result. That’s the key.... It doesn’t matter who we play. It matters mostly about us.”