LAKERS ROAR BACK TO PURGE A FEW DEMONS BRYANT'S CAREER-HIGH 43 HELPS SCUTTLE SPURS LAKERS 109, SAN ANTONIO 100.

Byline: Howard Beck Staff Writer

There were long-standing trends to dismiss and more recent bad precedents that needed whitewashing. The Lakers needed to right a few wrongs on the court, but mostly they needed to make a dent in the court of public opinion. So their agenda Friday night was more packed than the docket of the Florida Supreme Court.

Unlike some desperate politicians, the Lakers got the justice they sought.

That debacle in Seattle the night before? Erased from the memory bank, if not the loss column. The protracted losing trend against rival San Antonio? Expunged, pending appeals from the Spurs.

The Lakers, losers of nine of the previous 10 meetings with San Antonio, pulled out a 109-100 victory in dramatic fashion Friday at Staples Center.

For a while, it was a Lakers rout, than a Spurs squeaker. Finally, KobeBryant threw down the gavel and pronounced the issue dead.

The Spurs, who had clawed back from deficits of 20 and 10, got within 4 points in the final minute and a half before Bryant nailed a jumper to push the lead to a relatively safe 106-100. With it, Bryant also established a career high, finishing with 43 points.

Shaquille O'Neal added 36 points and 16 rebounds as the Lakers won for the sixth time in seven games.

Over the last two seasons, no team has frustrated the Lakers more than San Antonio. A critical analysis of the situation might suggest the Spurs were, ahem, in the Lakers' heads.

That's a psychological edge that coach Phil Jackson would just as soon not give anyone.

``I clarified that this morning (to the team) a little bit, as to what that number means,'' Jackson said of the Spurs' series edge. ``For these guys, they don't feel that way at all about it. So I had to impress upon them what you (reporters) think about this nine-in-10.''

As far as Jackson is concerned, two of last season's games were rendered meaningless by the absence of, respectively, Tim Duncan and Shaquille O'Neal. And one of the losses came in the final game of the season, a meaningless game to the Lakers.

But that all sounded like cheap rationalization without a solid Lakers victory to wipe away memories of the Spurs' dominance.

After so many missteps against the Spurs, the Lakers appeared to finally have the right formula in hand as they rolled to a 20-point lead by halftime. It nearly all came apart in just 9 minutes.

The Spurs stunned the Lakers with a 28-6 run to open the second half, and suddenly everything was going wrong. Duncan was scoring at will (12 points in the run) and the Spurs pulled within a point on a fluke play - Horace Grant's accidental tip-in of a loose ball after Sean Elliott's missed free throw.

San Antonio temporarily took a 3-point lead at 76-73 before the Lakers righted themselves. O'Neal and Bryant combined for all the points in a 9-2 run to close out the third quarter and give the Lakers an 82-78 lead heading into the fourth.

The rally never stopped. Robert Horry and Bryant converted consecutive fast-break jams off of great defensive plays, and O'Neal got a dunk himself as the Lakers pushed the lead to 89-78.

A few minutes later, Bryant's 3-pointer made it 98-82, and calm was restored to a temporarily panicky 18,997 at Staples Center.

It was the Lakers' fourth game in five nights, but they showed no signs of weariness in jetting out to a 62-42 lead by halftime. In fact, after all the talk of lacking energy in a 33-point loss at Seattle the night before, the Lakers reemerged looking positively charged up.

So maybe they were just conserving energy for those dreadful three quarters at Key Arena.

``It's not that we didn't have energy last night, it's that we didn't meet the energy,'' Jackson clarified before tipoff. He nevertheless rested his starters late in the Seattle loss in hopes they could rebound Friday. ``From that standpoint, playing four games in five nights, it's good to see if we can't save a couple minutes for guys since this is an important game for us.''

``This is a game we want to win,'' Jackson said. ``We'd like to have the night off like (the Spurs) had last night, come in here in a different situation, but it's not so. So we'll take it and go with it from there.''

O'Neal had 23 points and nine rebounds in the first half, and Bryant, fighting off illness, scored 16. The Lakers' defense did the rest, holding Duncan and David Robinson to a combined 8 points, and the Spurs to 39-percent shooting.

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Photo:

(color) Kobe Bryant celebrates a dunk during his career-high 43-point performance Friday night, an outburst that led the Lakers to a 108-100 win over the San Antonio Spurs.

Tom Mendoza/Staff Photographer

Box: Game Recap