Column:  As Lakers get first win, it sounds like old times at Staples Center

The roars were loud and long, their intensity and volume reaching levels once common at Staples Center during Lakers playoff victories and series clinchers and championship celebrations.

The Lakers didn’t win an NBA title Sunday. They won a game. One game, their first victory this season after five losses. And though an early-November, 107-92 victory over the Charlotte Hornets normally wouldn’t trigger much celebration, this come-from-behind triumph gave players and fans reason to rejoice during a season that has provided few enjoyable moments.

“The fans, they pay good money for these tickets. They don’t want to keep coming to these games and see us lose,” reserve center Ed Davis said after the Lakers held an opponent under 100 points for the first time this season.

“We got them the first one of the season and we’re going to go from there.”

Where are the Lakers going? That’s tough to say. We know, at least, that they won’t go 0-82.

It’s also certain that they’re headed into a tough part of their schedule. Had they not won on Sunday, they might have had a long wait for that first win because they will face Memphis and New Orleans back to back on the road Tuesday and Wednesday before returning home to face San Antonio and Golden State. After that, they’re on the road at Atlanta, Houston and Dallas.

So if it wasn’t now-or-never, it was close.

Sunday became now because they defended with some energy and had a balanced offense that wasn’t just Kobe Bryant and a bunch of other guys. Their success was constructed with 16 points from Carlos Boozer, 12 from Jordan Hill and 21 points and seven assists from Jeremy Lin, whose midcourt scream seemed to sum up fans’ long pent-up frustrations after he hit a three-point shot that gave the Lakers a 94-79 lead with 4 minutes 40 seconds left in the fourth quarter.

“They got into it,” Wesley Johnson said of the fans. “When we started making shots, that’s when the crowd got into it and everybody’s energy levels picked up a little more.”

And so did the Lakers’ confidence level. Asked if they would carry some momentum into those games at Memphis and New Orleans, Bryant spoke in a tone that was matter-of-fact. “I wouldn’t be shocked if we went out there and won both of them,” he said.

To get this first one, though, they had four days’ practice, four days of hearing Coach Byron Scott continually hammer the value of defense, of the need to see some aggressiveness from Boozer and Lin, and yes, of playing tighter defense. Players listened, holding Charlotte to 41 points in the second half that included a 25-6 run in the third quarter.

“When you’re 0-5 you tense up a little bit. You get a little tight,” Davis said. “Now it’s more like all right, we’ve got the first one under our belt and now we can go. Not necessarily the pressure is off our back, but you can breathe a little more and just relax and play.”

Not just play, but play like they did on Sunday against tougher opponents.

“I think what it does for us is just gives us the vision that we can win and we have gotten better,” Scott said, “and that these last four days, all of the work we put in paid off and now it’s just a matter of continuing to put that work in and continuing to go into every game with that same mentality.

“And we’ve got to play the way we did that second half for 48 minutes. We can’t play 24 minutes of solid basketball —we’ve got to put it together for 48 minutes. We’ve got to do it not only for one game, we’ve got to do it for a stretch of games, and that’s the next step for us.”

Scott said that his first victory as the Lakers’ coach held no special significance for him. “Right now it’s just a win. We’ve got what, 76 more of these things to go?” he said. “There’s lots of games left.

“I know the city and everybody probably feels good about it. Like I said, from Game 1 to Game 6 we’ve gotten better and that’s the whole thing about this process, just keep getting better as a basketball team.”

Davis called Sunday’s victory “just baby steps,” and that didn’t use to mean much around here. But it was a step forward, small though it might have been, and the return of a joyful noise.

helene.elliott@latimes.com

Twitter: @helenenothelen