Tuesday, June 8, 2004, Walton plays great game in front of his dad, Associated Press
LOS ANGELES -- Rookie Luke Walton was just hoping to get a chance.
He did, and looked like an old pro.
With his famous father watching from the stands, Walton provided the Lakers with a needed spark Tuesday night.
While Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neal made the biggest plays, the seldom-used Walton was a major contributor in helping Los Angeles beat the Detroit Pistons 99-91 in overtime to even the NBA Finals 1-1.
Walton didn't play in Game 1, and hadn't done much in the entire postseason -- no surprise considering how coach Phil Jackson feels about rookies in these situations.
But Walton played the last 10:20 of the fourth quarter and all of overtime, and made three big plays in the late stages, feeding O'Neal for a dunk for the final points with 1:22 remaining, then getting a rebound and tipping a loose ball away from the Pistons as the Lakers hung on to win.
Walton entered having played in 13 of the Lakers' 18 postseason games, averaging 1.5 points in 4.4 minutes with a total of 10 rebounds and eight assists.
"I love stuff like this -- I've always loved big games," he said. "Before every game, I visualize doing things. The assistants told me the coach flirted with the idea of changing matchups tonight and to be ready."
Jackson said before the game he had some personnel changes in mind, and one obviously was Walton, the first Los Angeles substitute to enter the game.
Walton, a second-round draft choice after an outstanding college career at Arizona, finished with seven points, eight assists, five rebounds and no turnovers in 27 minutes.
"Maybe sanity is the best excuse," Jackson said when asked to explain playing Walton so extensively. "I just needed somebody in there that could move the ball and had the ability to create things off the dribble. He held his own and actually was the player of the game, really, for us tonight."
The 24-year-old Walton played a total of eight minutes in four games in the Western Conference finals semifinals, when the Lakers beat Minnesota 4-2.
"We've been doing this all year. Coach, he makes sure we work hard in practice," Walton replied when asked how he stayed sharp.
Should the Lakers win the championship, Walton would become part of the second father-son combination to earn a ring. His father, Bill, led Portland to the championship in 1977 and helped the Celtics win the title nine years later.
Matt Guokas was a member of the Philadelphia Warriors team that won the title in 1947, and his son, also named Matt, played on the Philadelphia 76ers' championship team 20 years later.
New Jersey Nets star Richard Jefferson, a teammate of Walton at Arizona, said he kept wondering when Jackson was going to put his close friend back in the game.
"What he does is he makes it easier for other guys to score," Jefferson said. "He helps make everybody around him better. They played better with him in the game both times."
Karl Malone and Gary Payton, veterans who joined the Lakers last summer in search of their first championship, again contributed very little statistically.
But the Lakers managed to survive.
Malone, hampered by a sore right knee that had him limping at times, had nine points and nine rebounds in 39 minutes. Team spokesman John Black said afterward that Malone has a sprained ligament in his knee and is day-to-day.
Payton had two points in 28 minutes and didn't play in the fourth quarter or overtime. After boycotting the media after Game 1 and the following day, he spoke following Game 2.
"It's not a good feeling for me," he said. "A lot of things are going on. I feel like I'm not really helping -- I'm not used to this.
"I'm a winner, man. Right now I don't have a rhythm. This is one year that's not going the way I want it to go. I don't like the way I'm playing. I never lose confidence in basketball -- it's just frustration. It's happening, I've got to be a grown man and go through it."
Payton made it clear he wasn't bitter and didn't want to complain, saying: "We're in the finals, we're winning basketball games."