Lakers remain calm while playing waiting game

LOS ANGELES -- This is how it's going to be for the adjusting, healing Lakers, at least for a little while and maybe for a big while, waiting for their rhythm to get back, waiting for their superstar to get back, waiting to see if some opponent will make them pay for trying to come together as the playoffs are zooming along.

A lot like last year, in other words, and that seemed to work out OK. So pardon the defending champions for skipping the cold sweats and calmly understanding that Lakers 87, Thunder 79 on Sunday at Staples Center was part of the process, not a fright moment of panic.

This is going to take time. Kobe Bryant has a bad knee and a broken finger on his shooting hand and had missed four of the previous five games. Andrew Bynum has stamina issues and health issues after sitting out a month with a strained Achilles' tendon, not to mention the ever-present "Can-he-play-with-Gasol?" issues. His return after 13 games missed prompted a lineup change, Bynum going right back in as the starting center and Lamar Odom returning to a reserve role, and that was another adjustment.

Besides, in the real consideration, in the real plague, they're the Lakers. They don't do simple. This team is a Rubik's Cube on good days, and these definitely are not those.

Another team in another moment might have made them pay for it, but the Thunder let them off the hook. The Thunder were typically resilient, taking the potential blowout of trailing by 14 points in the first quarter and making the game competitive until late in the fourth, and the Thunder have the encouragement of knowing they kept it close despite an underwhelming game themselves, but underdogs in a 1-8 matchup don't get many chances to jump the defending champions at the start of a series, and Oklahoma City's big chance just went by.

"You could say that," Kevin Durant said.

Or that long odds on a series upset just got a lot longer. The Thunder had Los Angeles in a vulnerable place -- its star hurting, its starting center playing for the first time in a month, its style of play preferring something other than upstarts with young legs -- and couldn't close the deal. Durant missing 17 of 24 shots and the entire team going 40.3 percent from the field said so.

The Thunder can play with the Lakers. The Thunder just can't beat the Lakers four times in six games in the real perspective of Sunday's missed opportunity, bringing the real showdown back to L.A. against itself. Big shock.

Just like the lethargic 2009 first round against the Jazz and much of the wandering second round against the Rockets, both with Bynum in the early stages of trying to play his way back to prominence after a knee injury, the Lakers will decide how interesting the series becomes. Energy wasn't the problem Sunday, just as it wasn't for Oklahoma City. But it was grinding one out, a step in hoping to find a flow and pretty obviously an early step.

"I really can't speak to that issue, as to what's going to happen," coach Phil Jackson said. "This is what happened in this game. We know that we have to get easier baskets. We know we have to get some easier scores out there. That's an important aspect of our game, to get some easy baskets. We didn't convert much at all tonight in the open court. That's a part that you have to have."

The Lakers shot 41 percent and had as many turnovers as assists (14). They didn't knock out an inexperienced team when they had the chance. They got hurt again by a dragster point guard, with Russell Westbrook getting 23 points and eight assists against one turnover to spark the second-half recovery, requiring all of about 20 minutes to jump start one of the '09 storylines.

"We could have definitely played a lot better," Bryant said. "But at this stage, you've really just got to win games, no matter how you win 'em. We obviously need to do much better."

You could say that.

"And we will do better," Bryant continued. "But, still, it's better to squeeze one out."

Scott Howard-Cooper has covered the NBA since 1988. You can e-mail him here.

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