Lakers Win, Sent Packing

The Lakers’ 49th victory of the season was more farce than playoff tuneup, featuring elements of the absurd that could have happened only because of the presence of the lowly Denver Nuggets on Tuesday night at Staples Center.

After a 126-104 rout of the Nuggets, the Lakers will go for their 50th victory tonight against the Golden State Warriors and hope the Clippers defeat the Portland Trail Blazers or the Minnesota Timberwolves lose to the Memphis Grizzlies.

That’s the only way the Lakers can vault from sixth place to fifth in the Western Conference standings. Portland’s victory Tuesday over the Phoenix Suns ended the Lakers’ chances of moving to fourth and gaining home-court advantage in the opening round of the playoffs.

A Laker victory on the regular season’s final night, coupled with victories for the Trail Blazers and Timberwolves -- a likely scenario -- would leave the Lakers in sixth and facing the Dallas Mavericks in the best-of-seven first round.

“The important thing, as we close down the season, is that we tried to take care of business and rest our legs a bit,” Kobe Bryant said after scoring 32 points in 26 minutes and watching Jannero Pargo lead the second unit with a career-best 18 points in 27 minutes.

Or as Coach Phil Jackson put it, “This was the right type of game for us. We got everybody out there playing. It was like a good hard practice for us to get ready for Golden State [tonight].”

Asked if the Lakers might be better served in the long run by sending the second unit to face the Warriors tonight and accepting their fate as the sixth-place team in the West, Jackson began to list the reasons why they should play it straight.

“The game has to mean something,” he said. “It’s the 50th victory for us. If either team [Portland or Minnesota] loses, we move to fifth. Either way, it has meaning. Maybe if we saw Portland had beaten the Clippers, we might take some of our players out of the game and rest them. But, no, it has meaning and we have to play all the way through. Golden State has beaten us twice this season, so it does mean something.”

The Lakers closed the regular season at Staples Center with their 15th consecutive victory as the home team. They also had a 15-game home-court winning streak as they began the playoffs last season, going on to take their third consecutive NBA championship.

The opening was predictable enough Tuesday, with the Nuggets (17-64) hanging on the Lakers (49-32) at every chance, sending them to the free throw line 15 times in the first quarter instead of letting them run amok around the basket.

It would become electric, with Bryant toying with the Nuggets.

On one eye-catching sequence, Bryant turned this way and Vincent Yarbrough went that way, and Bryant lofted an open jump shot from the right baseline over his reeling opponent for an easy basket in the opening minutes.

Another possession featured Bryant hustling to swipe the ball from an unsuspecting Nugget, spinning into the paint and hoisting a one-handed double-clutch shot that found the bottom of the net for two more points.

Later, after Bryant scored 20 points on six-for-nine shooting with four rebounds, two assists and two steals in the first quarter, the reserves put on an inventive show of basketball that had the fans roaring.

Near halftime, Mark Madsen took a rebound and charged out of the backcourt to lead a fastbreak.

Before that remarkable sight could register with anyone inside the arena, Madsen pulled up near the top of the key and sent a lob pass toward a streaking Slava Medvedenko.

Never mind that Medvedenko was unable to catch Madsen’s errant pass and that Madsen needed two tips to nudge the ball over the rim for a 63-39 lead in the closing moments of the half.

The crowd loved it.

So did the rest of the Lakers.

“It was a lot of fun,” Bryant said. “It’s good to see some of the other guys get in the game and have a good time.”