Bulls Expose Lakers’ Youth

The Los Angeles Lakers’ kids were dunking and draining 3-pointers, running the floor and soaring over defenders. The Chicago Bulls were playing like old men, not the defending NBA champions.

And then came the fourth quarter.

“We were embarrassed. We’d look up into the stands and people were yawning,” said Scottie Pippen, who capped a 35-point game by making a driving layup with 42.7 seconds left in overtime as the Bulls rallied for a 129-123 victory Tuesday night in Chicago.

“We wanted to show our pride, our desire, our guts, and we knew that they didn’t have the experience down the stretch of big games,” Pippen said.

Michael Jordan, who Pippen said was “a little under the weather,” scored 30 points but was only 10 of 32 from the floor. The Bulls, who trailed by as many as 22 points in the first half, applied smothering full-court pressure that kept the ball out of Shaquille O’Neal’s hands. And Toni Kukoc carried the offense, scoring 23 of his 31 points in the fourth quarter and overtime.

“Every time I got the ball, I was going to shoot,” Kukoc said. “There was just no way I was going to miss.”

Nick Van Exel scored a season-high 36 points, O’Neal 27 and Eddie Jones 21 for the Lakers.

“We had it won, of course,” O’Neal said. “We beat ourselves.”

Elsewhere

The Atlanta Hawks made an NBA record 19 3-pointers in a 109-73 rout of the Dallas Mavericks. Mookie Blaylock made five 3-pointers for the visiting Hawks, who made 19 of 27 3-pointers to break the league record of 18 3s set twice last season by the Mavs, most recently on March 5 against New Jersey.

Chris Childs and Patrick Ewing scored all but four of New York’s fourth-quarter points and the Knicks won their seventh consecutive game with a 99-94 victory over the visiting Utah Jazz.

Tale of two Hardaways

The Miami Heat lost guard Tim Hardaway with a strained lower back, then lost to the visiting Indiana Pacers 103-89. Tim Hardaway strained his lower back in the first quarter and missed the rest of the game. Hardaway’s status for Thursday’s game against Utah was uncertain.

The Orlando Magic are making plans to be without Penny Hardaway for another 3-4 weeks while he recovers from the tendinitis that flared in his left knee after surgery. The uncertainty about Hardaway’s return - and the Magic’s recent struggles without him - are expected to prompt the signing of free-agent guard Kenny Smith, according to sources within the NBA.