Lights Out for Lakers in Oakland : L.A. Loses Second Straight for First Time This Season

OAKLAND —  It wasn’t as casual as Eric (Sleepy) Floyd, with his back to the glass, tossing the ball left-handed over his head and through the basket, his electric exclamation point to a 33-point, 15-assist night here Saturday night.

But for the first time this season, the Lakers have lost two games in a row, falling to Floyd and the Golden State Warriors, 124-109, before a sellout crowd of 15,025 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena.

The Warriors, who have beaten the Lakers in two of three meetings this season, broke an 88-88 tie with 11:06 left in the fourth quarter by running off 12 straight points.

The Lakers, who lost Thursday night in Utah, never recovered, despite 38 points by Magic Johnson, who made all 13 of his free throws and only his second three-point basket of the season.

Golden State center Joe Barry Carroll scored 30 points before fouling out, and the Warrior defense smothered the Laker fast break.

“That’s one thing we talked about at the beginning of the fourth quarter--to keep the pressure on them defensively, to keep playing aggressively,” said Warrior forward Greg Ballard, who came off the bench to grab 7 rebounds in 17 minutes.

“We’ve never had any problem scoring,” Ballard said. “But we wanted to be running back on our transition, get three guys back on defense, and we did a good job of that.”

Golden State outrebounded the Lakers, 53-40, and 26 of those rebounds came from the Warrior bench. Jerome Whitehead, Carroll’s backup, had 9 rebounds in 19 minutes.

The Warrior defense, a creation of new Coach George Karl, also forced the Lakers into 19 turnovers and held the Lakers to 46.9% shooting.

It was an especially long night for the Laker forwards. A.C. Green missed all six of his shots, did not score a point in 20 minutes and sat on the bench for the last 20:04 of the game. His backup, Kurt Rambis, went scoreless in 18 minutes.

James Worthy finished with 14 points but did not have a basket in the first half.

The Lakers, who trailed by 14, 36-22, a minute and a half into the second quarter, pulled within two, 51-49, as Johnson made all six of his shots in the quarter.

They fell behind by 10, 78-68, in the third quarter, but Johnson again brought them back, scoring 13 of their next 15 points to make it a three-point game, 86-83, at the end of three periods.

But after Johnson scored on a spinning move, was fouled and converted the free throw to tie the score at 88-88, the Warriors erupted.

Terry Teagle started the run with a baseline jumper, Whitehead connected on a short hook in the lane, and Ballard hit two straight jumpers from long range. Rod Higgins made two free throws, and Teagle took a feed from Floyd for a fast-break basket before Worthy finally broke the Golden State run.

“That’s when the game was decided,” Laker Coach Pat Riley said. “Both teams were playing extremely well at the time, but it was their second group that broke it open. They hit five straight jumpers. We seemed to take a step back against their bench.”

This would seem to be a step forward for the Warriors, but they may want to withhold judgment on that until Thursday night, when the teams meet again in Los Angeles. The Warriors, who have missed the playoffs for nine straight seasons, beat the Lakers by 10 points here in December, only to get blown out by 32 points three nights later, their worst loss of the season.

After the Warriors opened a 100-88 lead, the Lakers never came closer than eight points. By the time Carroll fouled out, with 3:26 left, the Warriors were ahead by 15.

Floyd, who hit three three-pointers, all in the first half, took his curtain call in the last half-minute, after one last blind fling at the basket.

Ballard claimed that Floyd has made the shot once before, which the Sleepy one confirmed.

“But it’s still improvised,” Floyd said. “I don’t go out and practice it. I don’t think George would let me take it too many times.”