This Time, Bryant’s One-Shot Half Is Just Right

Now that’s how to play a one-shot first half.

The number of field goals, make that field goal, Kobe Bryant attempted in the first half of the Lakers’ playoff-opening victory over the Houston Rockets on Saturday was the same as his controversial first half against Sacramento a week ago. The story behind it was completely different.

Bryant’s passive outing in Sacramento filled the airwaves and Internet chat rooms all week. He has had his frustrating moments of stubbornness in the past, but that was the first time anyone ever questioned whether Bryant was going all-out for victory.

There has never been a doubt about his ability. He reaffirmed his credentials with two amazing three-point baskets Wednesday night. If the Sacramento game raised eyebrows, the Portland game dropped jaws. No, the concern with Bryant was always his decision-making, whether he’d try to win games by himself or involve his teammates.

Coach Phil Jackson hammered the point home all week, and it was almost as if Bryant’s goal on Saturday was to prove Jackson right.

It was the smartest half of basketball Bryant played this season, practically error-free. He was moving at the right speed and making the right decisions. That’s one thing you could tell from the box score, which showed five assists and zero turnovers in the first half.

He went through the first quarter without a shot. On an early second-quarter possession, the Lakers cleared out for him and he went at his defender, got into the lane and drew a foul, making both free throws.

But he didn’t take that as a license to start firing up shots to make up for lost time. He didn’t try to force anything against a defense that was oriented to stop him. The next time he handled the ball he elevated for a baseline shot, only to see a second defender coming his way. So he fired a pass to an open Slava Medvedenko for the jump shot. He also found Gary Payton along the baseline.

What success the Lakers had was because they moved the ball well. Their problems were missing too many open shots (Karl Malone) and free throws (guess who), and not looking for Bryant a little more.

Bryant’s only mistake in the first half was missing one of his four free throws. Other than that he did everything he was supposed to.

“Kobe set up a lot of things in that first half for his teammates,” Malone said. “More importantly, what I liked was his demeanor. His demeanor wasn’t the demeanor,” in Sacramento. “He was more vocal, more coaching on the floor.

“The look he had, he wanted to win.”

Unlike the Kings, the Rockets are known for their defense. No need to look up the stats. They hold a team to nine points in a quarter, as the Rockets did to the Lakers on Saturday, that’s all the evidence you need.

“Great plan by the coaches,” Houston forward Jim Jackson said of the Bryant strategy. “I think Cuttino [Mobley] did a great job playing defense by staying on his feet, moving his feet. Then when [Bryant] did penetrate, our defense sagged on him all night, not allowing him to get to basket and do what he wanted to do.”

So this time you could believe Bryant if he said he couldn’t shoot because of the double- and triple-team, an excuse that most didn’t buy against the weak-D Kings. (He didn’t say anything to the media after the game Saturday.)

Bryant was great there too.

He usually plays great on-the-ball defense, but this time he was active away from the ball as well, jumping into passing lanes and blindsiding dribblers. He had four of his five steals in the first half.

People said Bryant is damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t. That’s narrow thinking. There’s a third option: a happy medium. That would be somewhere between the 13 shots he took in Sacramento and the 29 he took against Golden State in the next game. The average of the two, 21, right in the target zone for a couple of tell-tale statistics.

Bryant averaged 22.5 shots a game in the playoffs when the Lakers made their championship runs in 2001 and 2002, and you didn’t hear a bit of complaining.

Here’s the Lakers’ record when Bryant shot between 19 and 23 times this season: 13-2.

So the formula is there. Of course, the Lakers need his scoring, especially in the fourth quarter. It just wasn’t there Saturday.

They had the ball in his hands on their final possession, trailing by a point. Bryant dribbled to his left, pump-faked and fired up a three-pointer, hoping to recapture the magic of Wednesday night. This time he didn’t get quite enough under it. He shot an airball that O’Neal grabbed and went back up for the dunk, like Lorenzo Charles of North Carolina State so many years ago, and the Lakers hung on for 72-71 victory after Jim Jackson missed a three-pointer from the corner.

Bryant finished with 14 points.

He made four shots from the field.

On exactly 19 attempts.

Make it 14-2. Barely.

J.A. Adande can be reached at j.a.adande@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Adande, go to latimes.com/adande.