Lakers get 20-20-20 vision

Et tu, Knicks?

Hoping there was still someone they could beat in Staples Center before going east, the Lakers, instead, found themselves nine points down in the fourth quarter Tuesday night to the New York Knicks, the No. 14 team in the Eastern Conference.

However, they finished with a 29-9 burst and won, 120-109.

Coach Phil Jackson had told his team, which had lost three games in a row and four out of five, to “just go out and play.”

If anything, the Lakers overdid it, playing so relaxed, they let the Knicks come back from an early nine-point deficit and turn it into a shootout.

“Well, defense was a hope and a prayer for us the first three quarters,” Jackson said afterward. “We finally found a way to defend that made sense.”

If the Lakers’ defense was problematic to nonexistent most of the night, their offense was OK.

Three of them scored 20 or more points, including closely watched Lamar Odom, back as the No. 2 option in the absence of Andrew Bynum. Odom, who averaged 11.5 points for the first six games Bynum missed, had 22 Tuesday night with 12 rebounds.

Kobe Bryant just missed a triple-double with 24 points, 11 assists and eight rebounds, and Sasha Vujacic scored 12 of his 20 points in the fourth quarter.

On paper, the Knicks, the NBA version of the Bronx Zoo Yankees, looked like the answer to the struggling Lakers’ prayers.

If the Lakers think they have issues, they’re nothing compared to the Knicks. New York’s season has featured a sexual harassment trial, charges of spying on their own personnel and Stephon Marbury’s comings and goings before he finally had season-ending ankle surgery.

However, the Knicks started the night 5-3 since Marbury’s last game and put up a spirited fight.

Of course, their defense was a hope and a prayer too, giving the Lakers a chance to rally at the end.

In a season in which nothing has come easily, the Knicks started this five-game trip in Oakland, where they led Golden State by 10 points in the third quarter before falling, 106-104.

“I think if we can come out of this, we’ll be the better for it,” Coach Isiah Thomas said before Tuesday’s game of his team’s ordeal.

“If we don’t come out of it, definitely you can say it has taken its toll. But the perseverance that I’m seeing, the fight I’m seeing, the resiliency I saw last year, I’m starting to see those things again.

“Now, are we so far in a hole that we can’t get out of it? That I don’t know. But I do know there’s a commitment and a willingness in the locker room right now to play better basketball.”

Contrary to their reputation, the Knicks are now competing, as the Lakers found out in the first half after going up 18-9 early and leading 47-41 midway through the second quarter.

Then the Knicks’ reserves caught fire against the vaunted Lakers bench. With forward David Lee scoring 15 points in the first half, including a put-back that dropped after the buzzer, the Knicks led, 61-58, at halftime.

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Hitting the road

The Lakers begin a nine-game trip Thursday and won’t return home until after the All-Star break, when they host Atlanta on Feb. 19 (records through Tuesday):

Thursday: at Detroit (32-13)

Friday: at Toronto (24-20)

Sunday: at Washington (24-19)

Tuesday: at New Jersey (19-26)

Feb. 6: at Atlanta (18-23)

Feb. 8: at Orlando (28-18)

Feb. 10: at Miami (9-34)

Feb. 11: at Charlotte (18-27)

Feb. 13: at Minnesota (8-36)

Source: nba.com