Team Didn’t Exactly Get Its Pick-Me-Up

Looks as if this really is Shaquille O’Neal’s team, after all.

Proving again that if things don’t go wrong, they’re perfectly capable of messing them up themselves, the Lakers turned Monday’s game, in which they would have been favored, into another in which they looked like an expansion team.

Missing were not only Karl Malone (knee injury) and Kobe Bryant (bizarre garage accident), but O’Neal, who was suspended for ... cursing on TV?

Hard to believe as it may be, it’s true. O’Neal, who has sat out games for every conceivable injury and reason, just sat one out, hale and hearty, for bad language.

This was also a game the Lakers needed, assuming they think they have to do anything more than finish No. 8 in the West, but became just another disappointment in their growing list.

With both teams down an O’Neal, Shaq and the Pacers’ Jermaine, who had a sore neck, the Lakers were doing well to hit the rim, starting a long night by missing everything but the floor with airballs on their first three shots before succumbing, 85-72.

“Well, that was no fun for us out there,” said Phil Jackson, in the usual understatement.

Even if you couldn’t cover your children’s ears in time after Sunday’s game, there are things that can be said in O’Neal’s defense. The Lakers said them all, rallying around their fallen comrade as only caring people who’ve lost their meal ticket could.

The suspension was said to be a cruel blow to Pacer fans, who came to see Shaquille.

Shaquille gets beaten up so much, this was bound to happen.

The league overreacted. As Jackson noted, skipping the understatement as he often does when the league is involved, it is “known for its vindictiveness.”

It was even true, up to a point. Pacer fans were disappointed. Shaq does get worked over and almost always maintains his poise, during games, anyway. The penalty was harsh.

Of course, the Toronto game wasn’t that rough.

Facing the little Raptors, it was more like the Lilliputians climbing all over Gulliver. Shaq has endured worse, like the famous game in Chicago two seasons ago when he swung at Brad Miller.

Also, NBA Commissioner David Stern is a known over-reactor and an equal-opportunity one. Contrary to the long-running suspicion that he roots for the Knicks, he derailed them in the 1997 East semifinals, in which they led led Miami, 3-2, before five of them were suspended after a fight in Game 5. Three, including Patrick Ewing, were penalized for walking a few feet from the bench.

The Knicks had to serve their suspensions in platoons, three one game and two the next, so they could suit up enough players. They lost both games to end their season.

This is a tough league. Indiana’s Fred Jones got a technical foul Monday for looking at Slava Medvedenko in an unfriendly way after windmilling a dunk over him.

Shaq, who has a rambunctious sense of humor, used to refer to himself as a cross between Bambi and the Terminator, but this was more like a cross between Justin Timberlake and Lenny Bruce.

Large post-adolescent that he is, Shaq also continually tests his limits to see whether he still has any, as when he joked before this trip that he likes the road because of the “hotel food and pornos.”

Then came his latest misadventure. If it was much ado about whatever you decide it was, it was also childish, unprofessional and, worst of all, unnecessary.

So the Lakers, who have wasted so much of this season, and the ones before it, blew off another game, even if they tried hard, cutting a 22-point lead to nine, before bowing.

Of course, by then, they were down another player, Kareem Rush, who sprained an ankle in the third quarter, at which point the question was no longer how the Lakers would do on this trip, but whether they’d be able to finish it.

“If it mentally affects us, if we get mentally scared or morose behind this, I think it can affect us,” said Jackson afterward, in a rare show of concern.

“We have to play through this and understand, it’s a bad period of time and these things happen and they’re going to recover. Kareem’s going to be back. We have to fight back in Wednesday’s and Thursday’s games until we can get Kobe back, hopefully by Sunday.”

Sunday is five days away. Imagine the possibilities.