Race Is Going the Lakers’ Way

They have gone from focused to furious, racing past doubt, past expectation, past understanding.

The only thing the Lakers cannot outrun is the mind.

They sprinted over the Seattle SuperSonics not once but three times Tuesday, smothering an arena, leveling a coach, winning the Western Conference semifinal with a 110-95 victory. The mind also races.

Why can’t they do this to the Utah Jazz?

The Lakers shoot 79% in the first quarter, score so fast, on a 156-point pace, that during one timeout Coach Del Harris just looks at them and shakes his head, the lecturer speechless.

The SuperSonics close the gap to three points midway through the second quarter, the Lakers respond not with confusion, but with heart, with this: dunk, dunk, three-point basket.

The mind also races.

Why can’t they do this to the Chicago Bulls?

The SuperSonics make their final run, closing to within seven points with five minutes left, the roar deafening, and the Lakers scream back: Shaq bank shot, Shaq block, Eddie Jones hustle resulting in three free throws.

The mind also races.

Why can’t the Lakers win the NBA championship?

Really, why not?

What was supposed to be an ending Tuesday--the last step this team needed for this season to be considered a success-- instead has been wondrously transformed into a start.

If the NBA championship is to be won by the team that is currently playing the best, then that team should be the Lakers.

Why not?

The players are now asking themselves the same question.

“We’re real good . . . when we show up,” said Nick Van Exel, again a big-time player and whose four three-point baskets stopped a couple of SuperSonic runs. “If we continue to show up, we can go as far as we want to go.”

Before Tuesday’s game, the Lakers were hooting at the locker room TV as Karl Malone was crying for another foul in Utah’s final game against San Antonio.

This team is ready for that.

The Jazz awaits in Salt Lake City on Saturday with a team that is smart, strong and experienced.

But so were the SuperSonics.

The Jazz plays in the loudest place in pro basketball, an arena where the Lakers traditionally cannot win.

Just as KeyArena here was supposed to be.

“They are going to get some calls there, Malone is going to be everywhere, but if we hang in there. . . .” Van Exel said.

All season, the Lakers also have watched the Bulls on locker room TVs. But if they were intimidated, it didn’t show when they beat the Bulls by 25 points in February without Van Exel.

This team is ready for that.

The Bulls are supported by history, by legend, by sentiment, and by the best basketball player ever.

But who do they have who can stop Shaq?

In fact, when have the Bulls ever had to beat a dominant center to win an NBA final?

Answer? Never.

The six centers they have beaten in five years have been Vlade Divac, Kevin Duckworth, Mark West, Frank Brickowski, Ervin Johnson and Greg Ostertag.

“The way we’ve been playing . . . there’s times this team thinks it can win an NBA championship,” said Derek Fisher, who scored only two points but ran around with six assists and only one turnover Tuesday.

The mind also races.

Ten years after the last hurrah of Showtime, the Lakers travel to Utah with something far less sexy but just as efficient.

Call it Flowtime.

It took them a couple of years to figure out, but in the past week it has been startling.

It’s about rotating the ball between Shaq and Shaq’s Guys, not just for scoring, but rebounding and scraping and scuffling.

It’s about playing defense and rebounding as though you enjoy it.

It’s about going with the flow, not just when things are good, but when they are lousy.

“Mentally, we’ve awakened a great basketball team,” Seattle Coach George Karl said.

It started early here Tuesday, when the desperation of a team and town was everywhere.

In newspapers on the stands before the game, Karl talked about the season in past tense.

In the stands before the game, some fans held up a sign with a doctored photo of Shaq in long hair. It read, “Hey Shaq, You’re Our L.A. Woman.”

When the game began, Sam Perkins was a surprise Seattle starter, his job being to bump Shaq, while Detlef Schrempf was ordered to sag off Rick Fox and front Shaq.

Plug in Flowtime.

With the SuperSonics leading, 7-6, the ball found its way to an open Fox, who nailed a three-point basket. Then another one. Then another one. Then another one.

In nine minutes, Fox had more than half as many points (12) as he had scored in the previous four games of the series (22).

And the Lakers had a lead they would never lose.

“We knew it would be tough in this building. We had to come out and match their energy,” Fox said. “And we did.”

Four consecutive playoff wins. Each one more startling than the one before. Against a franchise that had not lost four consecutive games of any sort in six years.

Still sweating from his two-hour sprint, Shaq smiled at the thought of how far this team could advance.

“Right now, as far as we want to go,” he said.

The mind also races.