Playoffs 2000:L.A. absorbs most lopsided loss of season

L.A. absorbs most lopsided loss of season
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES -- For 12 minutes, the Los Angeles Lakers looked rattled, confused, disorganized, dispirited.


	Shaquille O'Neal was harassed by Blazer defenders all night.

The third quarter Monday night was the ugliest period they've played this season. And it came in one of their most important games.

"Oh, without a doubt," Kobe Bryant said.

"It was real bad," Shaquille O'Neal added.

"I've never seen anything like that," Robert Horry said. "You don't know what happened, where it came from."

The Lakers, trying to go up 2-0 in the Western Conference finals, trailed Portland 48-45 at halftime. By all rights, they should have been further behind.

They committed 18 fouls to 11 for the Blazers, leading to 25 Portland free throw attempts to their 11; were without O'Neal for the final 5:16 of the half due to foul problems, and benefited by just one Portland turnover in the opening 24 minutes.

So they had reason to be optimistic at the start of the third quarter. Instead, they were blown out en route to their first meaningful loss at Staples Center in exactly four months.

"It's just one game, we've got to keep going," Horry said after the Trail Blazers outscored the Lakers 28-8 in the third quarter en route to their 106-77 victory -- the most one-sided loss of the year for Los Angeles. "That's why we play seven."

The Lakers had won 24 of 25 home games, including seven straight in the playoffs, since a 95-91 loss to Portland on Jan. 22. The one loss was a 98-80 setback to San Antonio on April 8 in a game that came after the Lakers had clinched homecourt advantage throughout the playoffs. In addition, O'Neal sat out the game due to a sprained ankle.

Rasheed Wallace had 11 of his 29 points and five of his 12 rebounds in the third period, when the Lakers made only two of their 15 shots.

"He came out and just demolished us," Horry said of Wallace.

O'Neal, who had 41 points in the Lakers' 109-94 series-opening victory two days earlier, was limited to three points in the third period. He scored 14 of his 23 points in the fourth, after the outcome was decided.

"They played very aggressively, we didn't play well at all," O'Neal said. "They just came in there aggressive, then got all the calls, hit all their shots."

The Blazers were 11-of-19, including 4-of-7 from 3-point range in the period.

"We had a third quarter like their second quarter the other day," said Brian Shaw, referring to the 12-minute span when the Lakers outscored the Blazers 37-16 for a 63-42 halftime lead in Game 1.

"We just shot ourselves in the foot," Shaw said. "We settled for too many jump shots. We have to execute a lot better, figure out a better way to get it into (O'Neal). I don't think it's something that's major. We know what we've got to do."

It would behoove O'Neal and the Lakers if he did a better job at the foul line. The Blazers didn't need to employ the "Hack-a-Shaq" strategy they did in the first game, but O'Neal was a brutal 5-of-17 from the foul line, making him 18-of-44 in the two games.

"Shaquille had the ball inside there a number of times, but came away empty-handed," Lakers coach Phil Jackson said. "He missed foul shots, missed shots, no calls. ... It created a despairing kind of situation for us. I thought morality-wise, we really fell off. We didn't keep our morale as a team."

The Lakers have three days to get their morale back -- Game 3 of the best-of-seven series will be played Friday night in Portland. And now the Blazers have the homecourt advantage.

"It's all about challenges," said Bryant, who made only 2-of-9 shots and finished with 12 points. "I wouldn't play this game if there weren't challenges. The positive is you've got to go through adversity to be a champion."