Lakers might get some divine intervention in big game with Mavericks

The Lakers didn't appeal to a higher power Wednesday, though Archbishop Jose Gomez was at their practice, as was Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani from Peru, taking in a scrimmage from folding courtside chairs.

Gomez used to be a San Antonio Spurs supporter but switched allegiances after taking over leadership of the L.A. Archdiocese this month.

"A lot of people were praying and telling me to switch from the Spurs to the Lakers. Prayers work. Now I'm a Lakers fan," Gomez said. "I'm also praying for the Spurs, but a sign from God is that the Lakers are playing much better."

It's been that kind of a run, the Lakers 15-1 since the All-Star break.

Kobe Bryant spoke to both Catholic dignitaries after practice. Coincidentally or not, the Lakers play their biggest game of the regular season Thursday at Staples Center against Dallas.

The Lakers lead the Mavericks by half a game for second place in the Western Conference. The season series is tied at 1-1.

How big is Thursday's game?

Enough to turn Lamar Odom into a Clippers fan.

"I hope the Clippers get to beat [Dallas] up a little bit," he said a few hours before the Clippers played the Mavericks on Wednesday at Staples Center. "Hopefully, the game goes into two or three overtimes, a couple guys foul out, get nicked up."

It didn't quite work out as the Clippers lost to Dallas, 106-100.

Lakers database: All things Lakers

The dog days are long behind the Lakers, who are trending upward like no other team in the NBA.

Bryant rarely gives credence to a game before April, unless it falls on Christmas or, back in the day, is against Shaquille O'Neal, but he acknowledges the importance of Thursday's matchup against Dallas.

The Lakers (53-20) have nine games left in the regular season. They trail San Antonio by 3 1/2 games. Playoffs begin in a little more than two weeks.

"Around this time is when it starts," Bryant said. "Games start becoming big games because you're trying to build rhythm, you're trying to build consistency. All these games are good measuring sticks to see how we're going to go into the playoffs."

The Mavericks (53-21) have somehow stayed close to the Lakers despite losing third-leading scorer Caron Butler to a knee injury almost four months ago.

"I'm not surprised at all," Bryant said. "They have so much talent, so much depth. You look at their roster individually, and they're stacked."

Small forward Shawn Marion has picked up a lot of the scoring slack for Dallas, hovering near a 15-point average this month.

Sens snap Rangers’ streak with 2-1 shootout win

Erik Karlsson(notes) scored the lone goal of the shootout in the fifth round and the Ottawa Senators snapped the New York Rangers’ season-best, five-game winning streak with a 2-1 victory on Thursday night.

Craig Anderson(notes) and Rangers counterpart Henrik Lundqvist(notes) both made 29 saves through overtime and both denied the first four shooters in the tiebreaker. Anderson got some help in the fifth round when Ryan Callahan(notes) got off a weak shot because his stick broke on the attempt.

Karlsson then solved Lundqvist to win it.

The game mattered much more to the Rangers, the seventh-place team in the Eastern Conference. New York closed within two points of sixth-place Montreal, which lost at Boston, with seven games left. The Senators are last in the East.

Ryan Shannon(notes) had given Ottawa a 1-0 lead in the second, but Brandon Prust(notes) tied it early in the third.

A big scrum in the Senators’ crease with 1:40 left in regulation led to two minor penalties for each team that didn’t affect on-ice manpower. However, Ottawa forward Chris Neil(notes) was whistled for holding with 25.7 seconds left to give the Rangers a power play for much of the first 2 minutes of overtime.

Anderson kicked out Marc Staal’s(notes) shot just as Neil’s penalty expired, and a lead pass sent Neil in alone on Lundqvist, who pokechecked the rolling puck off his stick.

Prust got the Rangers even at 1 at 2:45 of the second period during a delayed-penalty call. Staal, who missed the previous two games because of an undisclosed injury, raced the puck up the middle but was cut down at center ice by a sliding tackle from defenseman Chris Phillips(notes). Staal got a pass off while on the ice to Prust, who glided into the right circle and snapped in his 12th goal.

The Rangers showed more life throughout the third period and generated chances that Anderson handled. New York killed Ryan McDonagh’s(notes) holding penalty just past the midpoint of the period.

Shannon broke the scoreless deadlock with 4:39 left in the second when he converted off a circle-to-circle pass from Bobby Butler(notes) and beat Lundqvist from the right for his 10th goal this season and fourth in five games. It came just 21 seconds after Ottawa’s first power play ended.

That marked the first time the Rangers were short-handed in two games after they earned a penalty-free, 1-0 victory over the Florida Panthers on Tuesday. New York had only one power play in that game and was given only one through 40 minutes against Ottawa.

Notes: Shannon had scored only two goals in 34 games before this recent spurt. … Senators D Sergei Gonchar(notes) missed his second game because of a concussion. … Rangers D Matt Gilroy(notes) sat out to make room for Staal. LW Sean Avery(notes) was a healthy scratch for the fourth straight game and for the fifth time in six. … The Rangers agreed to terms with free agent Jason Missiaen, a 20-year-old goalie who is 6-foot-8. He went 10-33-8 this season with a 3.33 goals-against average and .893 save percentage in 53 games with Baie-Comeau Drakkar of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.

Knicks hit team-record 20 3s, rout Grizzlies

Toney Douglas tied a franchise record by making nine of the New York Knicks' franchise-record 20 3-pointers, scoring 29 points in a 120-99 victory over the Memphis Grizzlies on Thursday night that snapped a three-game losing streak.

Carmelo Anthony scored 28 points and Chauncey Billups added 18 for the Knicks, who were 20 of 36 (55.6 percent) from behind the arc and moved back ahead of Philadelphia into sole possession of sixth place in the Eastern Conference.

Wearing green uniforms for St. Patrick's Day, the Knicks looked much better than they did during their slide. Douglas' sneakers were the wrong shade of green — sort of like the Hulk — but everything else was perfect. His ninth 3-pointer, with 17 seconds left, gave the team a record total and allowed him to match Latrell Sprewell and John Starks on the individual game list.

Mike Conley scored 16 points for the Grizzlies, whose lead was sliced to one game over Utah for the final playoff spot in the West.

Amare Stoudemire scored 16 for the Knicks, who shot 52 percent overall and were 18 of 21 at the free-throw line.

New York had dropped three straight since Anthony's jumper with 0.5 seconds left in a 110-108 victory at Memphis on March 9, allowing an alarming 117.3 points per game during the skid, which included a home-and-home sweep by a sub.-500 Indiana team.

The defense was better, but the story was the record-breaking perimeter game.

The Knicks turned an eight-point halftime lead into a blowout by hitting seven 3-pointers in the third quarter. Billups hit two early in the period and scored 12 points, while Douglas closed the quarter with two in the final 34 seconds as New York build a 92-74 lead.

Their previous record of 19 3s also came against the Grizzlies on Nov. 12, 2008.

It was a sorely needed win for a Knicks team that has been inconsistent while Denver has rolled since their blockbuster trade involving Anthony last month. The Knicks are now only 7-6 since, even though the struggles ultimately have meant nothing to their playoff hopes.

The Knicks are still in sixth, just as they were when the deal went down, and haven't been lower than that since they were seventh through games of Dec. 2, according to STATS, LLC.

Yet that's done nothing to relax a fan base with bulked-up expectations since acquiring a second star to pair with Stoudemire. Coach Mike D'Antoni joked the fans that are panicking should "take some Prozac or something."

"Hang in there, we're hanging in there, we're pedaling as fast as we can pedal," he said before the game.

"The biggest thing, and I'll just keep repeating," he added, "is that we're not going to get caught up in the hysteria and we're going to be who we are, we're going to play as well as we can and get it together and hang in as a group and try to make the playoffs and then try to do as good as we can."

No worries this time from the fans, who were too busy chanting Douglas' name in the final minute.

Neither team led by more than four points in the first quarter, which ended in a 29-all tie. Douglas, who makes the Knicks so much more dangerous when his outside shot is falling, was 5 for 6 from behind the arc for 15 points in the second period as New York took a 59-51 halftime lead.

NOTES: The Knicks are 2-0 this season in their green uniforms, which they wore while beating Chicago on Christmas. ... Memphis G Jason Williams had an MRI on his back that revealed no structural damage. He continues to be listed as out with lower back soreness. ... Stoudemire, Anthony and Billups will be featured on a segment of NBA TV's "True NBA" news magazine program next Monday night. The trio sat down with former Georgetown coach John Thompson for the interview.

In win over Lakers, Heat turn the tide

MIAMI -- The Miami Heat maintain that they don’t listen to the outside criticism. They say they don’t believe in the forced narratives from the media.

With their win over the Los Angeles Lakers, they effectively tore up the script, reversed the trends and busted the myths.

The conventional wisdom states that the Heat don’t have an inside presence. Against the biggest front line in the NBA, that purported Achilles heel didn’t seem to matter.

The Heat pummeled the Lakers on the boards on Thursday night, helping to snap the team’s losing streak at five games. Led by Chris Bosh’s newfound inside orientation, the Heat pulled down a season-high 18 offensive boards.

This was unexpected. The Lakers boast three 7-footers, in Lamar Odom, Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum. It seemed as though the incredibly big and equally hot Lakers were the last team the Heat would want to face after losing six of their previous seven games. But what the Heat lacked in size, they made up for it with aggressiveness.

“Anytime that ball went up at the rim, there was a fistfight under that basket,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “[The Lakers] are so big and so long that they can tip it in without even jumping. Our guys are really sacrificing their bodies and catapulting themselves into a pack to try to secure the rebounds and we got the big ones when we needed it.”

The Heat lack a menacing rebounder underneath, which is certainly one of their biggest weaknesses. During their five-game losing streak, the Heat averaged just 35.6 rebounds. On Thursday, they grabbed 46, which was nine more than the visiting Lakers, who ranked second in rebound rate coming into the matchup.

“The last two weeks I would agree with [the rebounding criticism],” Spoelstra said. “Before that, we’ve been playing big. Up until about February we were one of the better rebounding teams in the league and we were outrebounding most everybody we played. And then we went through a funk and we couldn’t rebound. I’m not going to overreact to what’s happened the last two or three weeks."

But the rebounding dominance wasn’t the only oddity during Thursday’s game.

The bench came alive, waking from its dormancy over the past few games with 24 points on 8-for-14 shooting, including 4-for-6 from downtown. The bench totaled just eight points in the loss against the Portland Trail Blazers on Tuesday, which was actually an improvement over the team’s six-point bench performance against the Chicago Bulls.

“I think our bench gave us what we needed and they made shots,” LeBron James said. “Both Mikes [Miller and Bibby] made huge shots. I think Juwan [Howard] came in and gave us some great minutes when CB [Chris Bosh] picked up those early two quick fouls.”

Howard’s 10 minutes was his first meaningful stint on the floor in more than a month.

And the surprises continue.

Remember the meme that the Heat can’t close out big games against good teams? Against the reputed king of clutch Kobe Bryant, that didn’t seem to matter much either.

With two minutes remaining and the game tied at 88-88, conventional wisdom would predict that Bryant and the Lakers would pull out the victory. But it was Bryant, not James or Dwyane Wade, who turned the ball over and missed desperate shots at the end. Bryant shot 2-for-6 in the fourth quarter, while the James and Wade combined for 6-for-10 in the final frame.

While many claimed the Heat’s late-game struggles were a product of some psychological flaw, Wade and James believe otherwise. After the game, their words weren’t focused on who got the ball for the final possessions, but rather who got the ball off the floor and in the air.

“We haven’t gotten the defensive stops, we haven’t gotten the loose balls, we haven’t gotten the rebounds,” Wade said. “I feel tonight we did all that. It’s just the little things like that. Just doing all the little things we did tonight to win the game is what did it."

The Heat pulled out a game that went down to the wire, which shook a sizable monkey off their back. Though the Heat won’t make too much of the win, it did provide an opportunity for some comic relief about the significance of the hard-fought victory.

“I think it also means that we still can’t win games within five points or less,” James joked. “We won by six tonight. I should have missed one of those free throws late in the game. We still can’t crack that five-points-or-less thing in close games.”

Raptors prepare for two-game stint in jolly London

TORONTO — Long flights and hotel rooms are a part of life for professional basketball players, but Toronto Raptors coach Jay Triano expects this weekend's road trip to provide an experience his team won't soon forget.

The Raptors face the New Jersey Nets in a pair of games Friday and Saturday at the 02 Arena in London, the NBA's first-ever regular-season games staged in Europe.

"There's 82 games in a season and I would think at the end of most of our players' careers, the two that they play in London might be the two they remember more than anything else, so it's a great opportunity for them," Triano said.

The games, which will be played at the basketball venue for the 2012 London Olympics, are part of the NBA's continuing bid to spread the sport's popularity globally.

The travelling party of 140 players, staff, sponsors and some season-ticket holders departed Tuesday night for London, where they'll hold basketball clinics, among other league obligations, before Friday's tipoff. There's also a team photo planned at Tower Bridge, which stretches across the River Thames.

"A lot of our young guys are from (Europe) but a lot of our young players have never been outside North America before, and it's a great opportunity for them," Triano said.

Amir Johnson and DeMar DeRozan are among the Raptors who had never travelled overseas.

"This is going to be my first time experiencing it, I said I was going to come back speaking British, so look out for that," Johnson said, laughing.

The games between two teams currently out of the playoff race aren't exactly marquee matchups. The Raptors are 17-44 and 13th in the Eastern Conference, beating New Orleans 96-90 on Tuesday for just their fourth win in their last 24 games. The Nets are a half-game ahead of Toronto at 17-43, and mired in a six-game losing skid.

Triano had initially called the long trip an annoyance, saying it could adversely affect what's already been a season of struggles.

"Dealing with the (five-hour) time change and the different culture and an arena that we haven't seen before. . . the Nets are in the same boat, but there are 28 others that aren't," Triano said.

But the coach was singing a different tune Tuesday night, hours before the team bus departed for the airport.

"There's not much difference between the flight from Toronto to London than the flight from Toronto to Los Angeles when we have the west coast trip," Triano said.

It helps, the coach added, that the trip is sandwiched between two stretches of games at home.

Both teams have been part of league trips off the continent before. The Nets played the Houston Rockets in two games this past pre-season in China after a stopover in Moscow for a basketball clinic. The Raptors held their 2007 pre-season training camp in Italy and Spain.

The Raptors have fielded one of the most internationally diverse rosters in recent years. This year's lineup includes Italian centre Andrea Bargnani, Spanish point guard Jose Calderon, plus Brazilian Leandro Barbosa, Lithuanian Linas Kleiza, and Frenchman Alexis Ajinca.

"I think it's exciting, it's nice to go to Europe, it's a little bit closer to home so it's going to be fun, building a little bit more chemistry, being in a different country," Calderon said. "I think it's going to be fun with some of the guys who've never been there."

The Spaniard said he'll have a large contingent of friends and family members at the games.

"It's an hour and 30 minutes from Madrid, so it's easier to go there than to Toronto for some of them," Calderon said. "It's a work trip as well, it's exciting but we're going there to win two games, we're not just going there to see the big sights."