Lakers Left Low and Dry

The Lakers were booed on Christmas.

They lost to the Houston Rockets, emptied Staples Center well before the last buzzer, and sent everybody into the rain wondering about the Lakers’ defense and if Karl Malone’s knee was getting any better.

They lost, 99-87, on Thursday night. They lost for the fourth time in six games, for the seventh time in two months.

They were booed. Not big and loud and ugly. Just enough, so they knew, in case they didn’t.

They played themselves back from a 16-point deficit and then scored 16 points in the fourth quarter, when Shaquille O’Neal missed his two shots and Kobe Bryant missed six of his seven.

They played themselves back into the game before a national television audience, before a crowd begging them for more fight, then had the Rockets make all the defensive plays, and make all the critical shots, and take all the decisive moments.

Failure comes, a reflective Phil Jackson said. It happens to teams with no superstars. It happens to teams with three, four including the knee brace. And yet, Jackson takes 20-some minutes to go from game’s end to news conference, the Laker locker room clears quickly and quietly and nobody would believe four losses in less than two weeks, two of them at home, with or without Malone.

It happens with the Lakers in their home holiday whites and the Laker Girls in their Christmas red velvet.

“You’re just going to lose basketball games,” Jackson said. “It’s part of living with the game. But you want to be competitive in all the games. The part about not being competitive in ballgames where the finish is in doubt until the last minute of the ballgame, that’s what a good team’s about. [Lacking] that competitive streak, knowing how to keep it close, stay in the ballgame. Those things I didn’t anticipate.”

The Rockets went from one point ahead to 10 points ahead in about six minutes of the fourth quarter, in an arena that only two weeks ago had held a 27-game regular-season winning streak. It was the Rockets who made the dynamic run, the Lakers who took the hasty shots, and the Rockets who raised their arms as the fans wondered where the victory procession went.

“We’re not a very good team right now,” Jackson said. “We just hit a slump in which we’re not a very good basketball club. It’s not about ... not competing, it’s about not being capable of competing because we’re not good enough to compete right now.”

Steve Francis scored 22 points, eight in the fourth quarter, when the Rockets cranked up their screen-and-roll and buried the heavy-legged Lakers. Jim Jackson and Yao Ming each scored 18 points. Maurice Taylor had seven rebounds and six points in the fourth quarter, when the Rockets made half of their shots and the Lakers made about a quarter of theirs.

“Vulnerable?” Rocket Coach Jeff Van Gundy said, a smile cracking his face. “No, no, no. They’re not vulnerable. Everybody goes through ups and downs. What are they, 20 and 7? You’re 20 and 7, you’re doing pretty good.”

The Lakers aren’t so sure.

O’Neal, determined against Yao, had 16 points and five rebounds in the first half and six points and five rebounds in the second. Bryant sat for three minutes of the fourth quarter, still managed those seven shots, and finished with 23 points on nine-of-26 shooting.

In the second half, Bryant was five for 17 from the floor. O’Neal was 0 for 4. Gary Payton played 41 minutes and scored 13 points. Malone was at home, recovering from a sprained knee, at least another game from playing. Did they miss him?

“No,” Bryant said, rolling his eyes and pushing the sarcasm. “He’s only a Hall of Famer.”

The Lakers spent most of the game a step behind the open man. They spent the game shooting 37.6% from the field, leaning into open jumpers that did not fall, and then chasing long rebounds to the other end.

They trailed by 13 points at the half, by two after three quarters. The fourth quarter came and, despite their hardwood sins, they were tied, and the crowd liked them again, and the shots fell. And then they didn’t and Jackson called a timeout and looked into their weary eyes.

“You guys think you’re tired,” he said he told them. “You guys act like you’re tired. You’re playing like you’re tired. But you’re not tired.”

The Lakers missed 10 of their last 12 shots.

“It’s a mental condition that you have to break through,” Jackson said later. “We couldn’t dig deep enough to find that.”