Vitti Does Yeoman Patchwork

Gary Vitti walked into Staples Center three hours before game time Saturday, the Laker trainer smiling at his task, five players on the 12-man roster requiring near round-the-clock service.

“This is the first game?” he said, laughing. “It feels like Game 7.”

Vitti and his medical staff put Karl Malone, Rick Fox, Derek Fisher, Devean George and Kareem Rush back together again in the time between Wednesday’s game at Portland and Saturday’s against the Houston Rockets.

Among other solutions, Vitti secured a harness for Fisher’s groin strain from former Olympic sprinter Quincy Watts. George, who has a sprained calf, was fit for a special wrap that put extra pressure on his sorest point.

Malone, who sprained his right ankle Wednesday, was treated by Vitti every day leading up to the playoff opener.

“Karl’s been great,” he said.

Then Vitti, the Laker trainer for two decades, raised his hands.

“I’m going to dress 12 tonight,” he said. “How that goes, we’ll see.”

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Given the choice of nine championship rings, not including the two he won as a player, Phil Jackson chose Saturday night to wear his ring from the 1999-2000 season, his first with the Lakers.

In most playoff seasons, Jackson has worn the ring from the previous year. But the Lakers did not win one last year, leaving him a safe-deposit box full of options.

On a night he wore a purple shirt and gold tie, Jackson went back to his Laker roots.

Incidentally, his rings are sized for different fingers. This one fit on his right pinkie.

“I’ve never gotten one for my thumb,” he said.

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For Luke Walton’s first playoff game, his father, Bill, called the game for ESPN, and his brother Chris was in attendance, as was his mother, Susan. Chris plays basketball for San Diego State.

Brother Nate, the former gubernatorial candidate, would have been here, but he recently had shoulder surgery, the injury caused in an off-season pickup game with New Jersey Net Richard Jefferson. He is recuperating at Luke’s Manhattan Beach apartment.

Adam, another of the four Walton boys, watched from San Diego.

Told it was like his rec-league days, Luke smiled and said, “Only with a few more people watching.”

“I’m definitely a little more nervous,” he said, “and a lot more excited.”