Hello from Indiana, everybody.
Generally, I’m just ready for the National Anthem to be over as soon as it begins, but tonight’s singer, a cast member from the “Lion King,” was fantastic. She could have kept singing for a lil’ bit and I wouldn’t have gotten too upset. By the way, I just noticed that Luke Walton does pushups while the other team is being introduced and the lights are out. Thought you should know.
Your starters:
Lakers: Fish, Kobe, Vladi, Pau and Bynum
Pacers: T.J. Ford, Marquis Daniels, Danny Granger, Troy Murphy and Rasho Nesterovic
First Quarter
The Pacers came out of the gate strong to take a 9-4 lead after Granger hit his first three (as I mentioned in the “10 Things” entry, 35 percent of Granger’s shots are from three), though Vladi answered a moment later with his first triple of the evening. Granger’s shooting just 37 percent from three, while Vladi was around 48 percent heading into the game.
Something we’ll have to keep an eye on (which is the case on many nights) is the lack of depth on L.A.’s opponent’s bench in comparison to its own. The Pacers’ second unit was tested early in this one, as Daniels was tagged with two early fouls trying to defend Kobe, bringing rookie Brandon Rush into the game near the 6:30 mark. Also checking in for the Pacers moments later was Stephen Graham, which is my essential point here: you may not have ever heard of him, but he’s a fourth-year forward out of Oklahoma State. He’s averaging 3.2 points this season. Alas, Rush was able to can a three, and Nesterovic went for eight early points to put Indy up 24-23 at the 2:53 mark. We certainly haven’t seen the Lakers lock down defensively at this point…
L.A. came in with Trevor Ariza, Lamar Odom and Jordan Farmar off its bench, which immediately produced a slashing Ariza layup, a nice defensive possession, a Gasol layup in transition and 1-of-2 Bryant free throws that gave L.A. a 28-26 edge. The lead grew to four when Pau hit two free throws, though rookie center Roy Hibbert from Georgetown managed a layup in the closing seconds to put the margin back at two heading into the second quarter. I’d also be remiss not to mention newly-checked-in Sasha Vujacic’s miss from the baseline as time expired, a triple that I’m sure he’s mad to quite mad about missing.
Funny Video Clip from last week: Remember when Devin Harris of the Nets spent some time chilling with the Laker girls after falling out of bounds? Pretty solid.
Second Quarter
I typed “the Lakers should be going inside to Bynum every possession, Nesterovic can’t come close to guarding him” before Bynum spinned and dunked on Rasho’s dome, all nasty like. Before that dunk, Bynum had eight points, all but two of which came within a few feet of the rim. If you listened to the pregame interview with Stu Lantz, you heard him analyze this game, but you didn’t hear us talk for a few minutes afterwards (obviously … thanks Mike). One topic we covered was how nice it was to see Bynum get angry after Joey Graham (Stephen’s brother, by the way) nearly injured him by not getting out of the way on an alley-oop attempt. He’s been a bit angry down on the block tonight, which absolutely bodes well for the rest of this season.
Here are things I’d do if I were guarding Bynum:
A) Punch him
B) Kick him
C) Crouch behind his legs like you did while tripping people circa fourth grade (you know, when your friend would push the victim from the front)
D) Treat him like he was Alonzo Mourning and I Jeff Van Gundy
Back on the floor, Ariza was flying all over the place on defense and streaking up the floor in transition, resulting in five points, two boards and a steal (he didn’t get credit for the swipe in the box score, for no apparent reason) that gave L.A. a momentary one-point lead at 43-42, though Indy rolled off four straight points for a 46-43 lead, causing a timeout at the 5:47 mark.
Off the top of your head, whom would you say is the best rebounder on the floor? Gasol? Bynum? Odom? In terms of numbers, it’s Troy Murphy, who’s third in the league on the glass and already had eight boards with 4:00 to go in the second. A more outstanding statistic at the 3:30 mark was that L.A. had already been to the line 23 times, though they’d only been able to convert 16 of their shots (69.6 percent).
Granger’s second three of the ball game gave the Pacers a three-point lead at the 2:13 mark, just in time for another TV timeout. I was still focused on the PA announcer, who says “Home Run!!!” every time an Indy player hits a three. Let’s play multiple choice about that:
A) Annoying
B) Not creative
C) Not applicable
or
D) All of the Above
A nicely orchestrated play out of the timeout resulted in Vladi’s second three, a wide-open look courtesy of a backpick from Odom and pass from Gasol that tied the game. The Lakers followed with consecutive finishes at the rim by Bryant, on either side of the rim off the glass, to take a four-point lead. The Pacers then turned the ball over (traveling), and my favorite play of the season occurred.
After Bryant up-faked Rush into the air near the free throw line, he stepped through, threw the ball of the glass to himself and finished a layup. It was sooo much cooler than I just made it sound. Literally everyone in the arena simply looked at whomever they were sitting next to, shook their head a few times and smiled. That’s dumb. Idiotic.
“Does he get an assist for that?” asked a random Indiana media member to my left. Hmmm … good question. YouTube that.
Then on the next possession, just in case people weren’t watching that play, Bryant then crossed Rush over again, darted into the lane, drew a foul and stuck a reverse layup off the glass to give L.A. a 66-59 lead. Granger did hit a buzzer-beating J from 18 feet, but as the buzzer sounded, all anyone was talking about was Kobe. Rightfully so. That was freaky*.
*Apparently my dad didn’t get that reference, just like he missed “dime” a few weeks ago. Anyone else dislike that word choice? I could have said: awesome; crazy; sweet; tight; or money instead, I guess…
Third Quarter
While walking around the Conseco concourse, which is littered with the state’s basketball history (pretty cool), I realized that Kobe’s final bucket of the half made him the second youngest player to reach 22,000 career points. He led all scorers with 16 at the break, while Gasol added 13 and Bynum 10. L.A. shot well as a team (54.8 percent), though the Pacers were right there at 52.9 percent. Indy got nine second-chance points to just two for L.A., and held their own on the glass (22-20 L.A.).
However, the Lakers coaching staff was anything but happy with L.A.’s defense in the first half. I overheard sideline reporter John Ireland say this Jim Cleamons quote: “It’s like we left our defense in L.A. - we’re playing giveaway, it’s ridiculous.”
But let’s go back to Kobe: the half didn’t cool him down a bit as he converted his first to jumpers of the third to give L.A. a 71-66 edge after nearly three minutes. His jumper a minute later went down as well, giving him the Lakers’ first seven points of the quarter.
Cleamons wasn’t too happy a minute later when Radmanovic gave the ball away to Granger in the Lakers’ defensive half, allowing the Pacers to get within one after free throws. Coincidentally, Ariza checked in for Vladi. Moments later, Fisher nailed a top-of-the-key three, which Daniels eradicated with and and-1. Then the Ariza sub paid tangible dividends as he stole the ball near midcourt and converted the breakaway dunk for an 84-80 Lakers lead.
Apparently Josh McRoberts read this running diary at halftime, because he just chose option A in how-to-defend Bynum by absolutely clubbing ‘Drew over the head after a Bryant pass. It worked, because Bynum missed both free throws, L.A.’s 10th and 11th misses of the evening. I just bolded that because it’s bad (64.5 percent), and because the Pacers capitalized by briefly taking the lead at 86-84 after two Granger free throws. Indy was a perfect 11-for-11 at that point.
OH no … injury scare at the 2:07 mark, when the rangy Ariza made two great defensive plays on one possession, then sprinted full court to draw a (flagrant one) foul on Danny Granger. It looked bad at first, because Ariza landed on Granger, and his knee almost buckled underneath him, but thankfully he popped immediately up and made both foul shots. The Lakers kept the ball due to the fragrant foul, and capitalized with a Farmar bank shot.
Two great plays from Farmar (a behind-the-back pass to Bynum) and Ariza (ANOTHER steal in the defensive half court plus the breakaway dunk) preceded a Vujacic triple to suddenly put the Lakers up 97-86. With Bryant cheering demonstrably from the bench (stuff like “Yeah boy!” “Get some Jordy!” “Come on ‘Drew!), Odom picked off a pass, then lobbed a beautiful alley-oop to Bynum for a reverse jam, plus the power. Bynum’s sixth board after a Nesterovic miss then resulted in two foul shots at the other end, completing a phenomenal defensive stretch from L.A.’s second unit that produced a 101-86 score.
OK … I was too busy typing to follow that completely, so let’s consult the play-by-play. Sure enough, that was a 17-0 run to close the quarter after two Granger free throws. The final 15 points came with Bryant sitting on the bench, Bynum as the only starter on the floor with Farmar, Vujacic, Ariza and Odom. The whole thing took only 2:28 seconds. Oh, snap.
“Best Actor in a Lead Role” of that run go to Ariza, with … well … every other Laker earning “Best Supporting Actor” accolades.
Fourth Quarter
Jackson understandably stuck with the second unit to start the fourth quarter, but T.J. Ford wasn’t about to let the run continue as he sparked the Pacers to a 10-3 run, forcing a Phil timeout with 9:04 remaining. Ford scored four points of his own and set up Marquis Daniels twice, while L.A.’s only bucket was Vujacic’s third three pointer of the game on four attempts. Alas, on came the starters: Kobe, Pau, Vladi, Bynum and Fisher.
That didn’t affect Ford, who immediately picked Fisher’s pocket and scored in transition to make it a six-point game. The lead could have been cut to three had Granger not missed for the 16th time (7-of-23), though Vladi was called for a charge on L.A.’s next possession, meaning the Lakers were still stuck on three points at the 7:03 mark of the fourth. Finally, Bryant got on the board with a free throw (but missed L.A.’s 12th) and watched Gasol hit a 10-footer to make it 107-100 at the 5:32 mark.
After Granger hit a three to make it a six-point game again, he was wide open on the following possession, but couldn’t get the rock, meaning we all had to listen to his extremely high-pitched shrill that sounded like some bird of prey’s mating call. He did hit a 20-foot jumper, however, which was nullified on a “professional” play from Fish, who drew a foul on Ford while shooting a contested jumper thanks to some flailing limbs.
Another fantastic play from Ariza came on the next possession, when he annihilated a Daniels’ layup attempt. He must have forgotten that it was Granger, not Daniels, who put the flagrant on him. Eh … I guess Trevor doesn’t discriminate when it comes to ball thievery.
Gasol and Nesterovic traded hoops before an Odom triple rimmed out, before Granger canned a contested three of his own to cut it to one at the 1:45 mark. Gasol then missed a 17 foot jumper, and Daniels drew a foul at the other end, converting both free throws to bring Indiana all the way back from the 15-point deficit it faced heading into the fourth. How about that?
But wait, you’ll never believe this: the Lakers cleared out the court for Bryant, who dribbled around for a bit, then pulled up and canned a jumper from 22-feet on Daniels. No joke … Bryant hit a big shot to put L.A. back in front with 58.4 to go. Shocking, I know.
A tremendous … let me say it again … tremendous defensive possession resulted in T.J. Ford badly missing a baseline jumper. Ariza was the key, stepping out to get in Granger’s face, while Odom quickly came over to double both Granger and Ford to force the end-of-the shot clock jumper that went off the edge of the backboard. But surprisingly, Bryant missed a very makeable jumper with 12.8 remaining, giving Indy a chance to win the game.
And win it they did … Somehow. After another 10 seconds of great defense, Daniels got the ball along the baseline and missed a reverse layup. But Murphy got a hand on the ball, tipped it up off the glass, and the ball rolled around the rim for a good two seconds before it went down.
Huh?
The Lakers, who never seemed at all worried about losing this game, didn’t even believe it as they walked off the court. The first road loss of the year, in Indiana, with an improbable left-handed prayer tip from the league’s third leading rebounder, on his 17th board of the game. After it went down, Bryant slammed the ball down in disgust, while Fisher, Ariza and other stayed on the floor in shock.
Granger led all scorers with 32, while Ford had 21 and Murphy, Nesterovic and Daniels 16 each. The Lakers were led by Bryant’s 28, plus 20 from Gasol and Bynum 17.
But, again, wait a second … L.A. actually lost this game???
