Lakers Cut No Slack in Win

When the issues multiply with a March winning streak, it could only be a Laker regular season.

When the Lakers win again, when they finish in overtime what escaped them in regulation, when Shaquille O’Neal gets 31 points and 26 rebounds and Kobe Bryant takes charge anyway and everybody rediscovers Karl Malone in two overtime jumpers, it could only be the Lakers who wonder what’s next.

They beat the Milwaukee Bucks, 104-103, Sunday night at Staples Center. The victory was their fifth in a row, the 16th in 20 games since the All-Star break.

Bryant missed a long jump shot at the end of regulation, then made one near the end of overtime, and so they all staggered a little closer to April, unsure of what they can do together, or if wins mean momentum going into a week that will have the Sacramento Kings and the Minnesota Timberwolves.

They blew a 15-point lead to the Bucks. They scored 18 points in a 17-minute stretch in which the Bucks went from looking for the bus keys to getting shots to win it. Then, as the building gasped at every Keith Van Horn jumper, as it clung to every Bryant turn-around 20-footer, the Lakers scraped around, found the point necessary to win, and managed a few exhausted smiles on their way from the floor.

Bryant had 22 points, including the last eight of regulation and the last two -- on a 16-foot jumper with 25.1 seconds left -- of overtime. The shot was reminiscent of the one that helped beat the Houston Rockets 2 1/2 weeks ago, this time with Van Horn nearby.

“I knew I could put arch on the ball and get it over the top,” Bryant said. “I shot the ball over Yao [Ming] before, so Van Horn was pretty easy.”

The Bucks led, 103-102, on Michael Redd’s midrange jumper and Van Horn’s three-pointer, fell behind on Bryant’s shot, and then gave the ball to Van Horn on their final possession. Against Devean George, he drove the left side of the lane, pushed up a runner that was not close, and the Bucks were done, though Van Horn and Coach Terry Porter argued for a foul.

Of course, that wasn’t the end of it. Bryant was a bit too aggressive with his shot in the fourth quarter for O’Neal’s taste, given that O’Neal would finish the game having made 14 of 16 field-goal attempts, but had only three attempts in the fourth quarter. And, O’Neal wasn’t pleased with Phil Jackson’s rotation, the second unit’s being largely responsible for the failure to maintain a 74-59 lead.

“We had too many experimental lineups in there,” O’Neal said. “I would like to see our core eight to nine guys in there at all times. But, whoever’s in there, we still have got a job to do and we’ve still got to play defense and we’ve still got to fight. We’re winning games. We’re not winning them pretty. We’re fighting. We know we have a lot of fight. We can’t do this against the better, experienced teams.”

Asked if Jackson knew his feelings on it, O’Neal said, “He knows. I’m sure by the time the postseason comes around, we’ll have our eight, nine guys that we always do.”

Jackson responded that the rotation might have looked better to O’Neal had O’Neal not removed himself from the game with five minutes left in the third quarter, a Slava Medvedenko-for-O’Neal substitution that coincided with the collapse.

“Well,” Jackson said, “he asked out in the third quarter, when we were up by [15]. That started it.”

Meanwhile, the Lakers did all the little things to keep the Bucks in it, then won for the fourth time in four overtime games. They won in spite of themselves. They ignored O’Neal. They had 18 turnovers. They played defense every third or fourth possession. They scored 14 points in the fourth quarter, when 15 would have won.

When he didn’t take a shot in the first quarter, O’Neal decided it would be a night for rebounding, and took nine of them in the period. Of course, he didn’t get many shots in the fourth quarter, either.

“Yeah, I know,” he said.

Asked why, he shook his head.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know. You know. Write it.”

He sighed, as if the subject were too old to even think about.

“We’re still learning each other,” he said. “We’re going to be fine. Offense isn’t really our problem. We have to know how to demolish teams once we get them to where we want them.”