Oh, and L.A. hasn’t lost back-to-back games since March.
The Nuggets might very well be the better team in the Western Conference finals, with a deeper bench, more muscle and better health than the tired, injured and often disjointed Lakers. But Denver also tends to implode at the worst times.
There’s the taunting after big shots, the complaining after calls and the botched inbounds passes that cost the Nuggets in Games 1 and 3.
Now, they’re one loss away from summer vacation.
“For most of the series, we outplayed them for most stretches of the game,” Denver guard Chauncey Billups said. “We just couldn’t get over the hump in the fourth quarter in a few different situations.”
Denver has committed 11 technical fouls in the series and defensive standout Dahntay Jones is one more flagrant-1 foul away from a suspension.
Coach George Karl said he won’t rein in his players for Game 6 tonight, however.
“You guys are almost saying you’ve got to have savvy and poise to be a championship team,” Karl told reporters Thursday. “You think the Detroit Pistons have the poise that the San Antonio Spurs have? No. There’s a different way of handling emotional, passionate, intense players. We have some guys who are emotional, maybe a little too emotional. But I’m not going to tell them to stop that because I think that stops them from becoming a competitor.
“Right now, we’re competing on the best stage on a pretty good level. I think the Lakers know we’re there.”
The Lakers have plenty of their own problems, inconsistency among them, but in Game 5, they showed they’re not always so soft in the middle and they don’t have to be a one-man band, either.
The Lakers finally discovered ways to get more balanced play, especially from their big men.
“We may have found some things we can do that allows us to attack them from everywhere,” Lakers guard Derek Fisher said. “We feel we can’t be beat when everybody’s getting a chance to play.”
Kobe Bryant lured double coverage then passed to his teammates with Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol doing the damage inside in the fourth quarter as the Lakers capped a 23-5 run and cruised to a 103-94 win Wednesday night.
“We’ve had stretches where we’ve played excellent de-fense,” Bryant said, “but the competition we’re facing with this Nuggets team is unlike anything we’ve ever seen. They have so many scorers, they have an inside presence. So I’m very proud of how we performed in that stretch.”
Karl thinks Lakers coach Phil Jackson’s rant helped, too.
Although it drew $50,000 in fines, Jackson’s complaint about the officiating in Denver paid off in the Lakers’ 16-7 advantage at the line in the fourth quarter, Karl suggested.
So, Karl took his own crack at the crew, suggesting Nene fouled out thanks to three or four phantom fouls and questioning how Gasol (one foul) could have played such a clean but active game.
