Score One for Celtic Green and Redhead : Boston and Walton Give Lakers a Reminder, 110-95

BOSTON —  Want to know why the Boston Celtics had such an easy time with the Lakers Wednesday night? Pat Riley quickly ticked off four good reasons.

“Better, bigger, longer, stronger,” he said.

If that sounds more like some kind of new, improved laundry detergent, then the product came in a shiny green and white box, too. The Celtics, for at least one night, gave the Lakers something to think about for a while.

“We are the better team--tonight,” Celtic guard Dennis Johnson said.

The Celtics heard no opposing arguments in Boston Garden. They beat the Lakers, 110-95, winning so convincingly that maybe all the talk about the Lakers being possibly the best NBA team in history can be laid to rest. So much for truth in advertising.

“We can all read the newspapers,” Celtic Bill Walton said. “We didn’t have to say anything to each other about this game.”

The last guy in the Laker locker room read the box score and had something to say.

“We took a good whipping,” Magic Johnson said. “But we’ll be back.”

There was some question whether Johnson should ever have left. Maybe he should have stayed in his hotel room. His right knee, the one he bruised more than a week ago, is still swollen and sore, which severely affected his mobility and some other things--like the Laker offense.

With Johnson hurting, the Lakers failed to score 100 points for the fourth time this season, shot a season-low 38.6%, allowed the Celtics 42 defensive rebounds and generally kept out of sight the entire game.

The Celtics had no such problems. With Dennis Johnson scoring 22 points to go along with 21 from Larry Bird, Boston kept the pressure on the Lakers to the end. And so did Walton, an addition to the Celtic team that lost to the Lakers in last season’s championship series after winning the year before.

Without Kurt Rambis, whose absence was duly noted, the Lakers got worked over inside, and no one was any better than the red-haired Walton. He blocked seven shots. He took down eight rebounds. He dunked. He had just a great time. And he did it all in only 16 minutes.

“I love playing against those guys,” said Walton, whom the Celtics acquired from the Clippers for Cedric Maxwell. “I’ve played a lot of my life against the guys on that team. I’m a Southern Californian, and I still consider that my home. I just get fired up for stuff like that.”

The Lakers started slowly but trailed by only eight points at halftime, 57-49. Unfortunately, they never got any closer the rest of the way, and their frustration grew along with the Celtic lead, which once reached 23 points, 104-81, in the fourth quarter.

There was one play that typified the way things were going for the Lakers. Celtic Kevin McHale missed a jumper, but Walton beat three Lakers to the rebound and dunked to end the third quarter and give the Celtics an 88-75 lead.

After that, it was really all over for the Lakers, who finished their three-game trip with two losses. Now, after a 19-2 start, the Lakers have dropped to 32-8. So they are only 13-6 since their quick start.

Meanwhile, the Celtics are 31-8 and have won six straight and 10 of 11. They are hot, and the Lakers are not--at least not anymore. Part of the reason is because they’re hurting.

“Sometimes you’re 100% ready, and other times, you bring what’s left and hope it’s good enough,” Riley said.

This was one of those nights when it wasn’t good enough. Johnson, wearing an ice bag on his knee, said he wouldn’t have played if the opponent hadn’t been the Celtics. He was asked whether he will play against the Clippers Friday night at the Sports Arena.

“If I feel this way then, no, I won’t play,” Johnson said.

Although Rambis wasn’t here, the rest of the Lakers were healthy, but they played tired. They also played poorly. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar scored 17 points to lead the Lakers, but he shot only 6 for 20.

It got so tough for the Lakers to score that they didn’t make a field goal for more than seven minutes of the fourth quarter.

“I took a lot of bad shots,” Abdul-Jabbar said. “We didn’t have the goods tonight.”

No, they had the bads instead. But as Riley said, the Celtics had a lot to do with that.

“It was obvious they took the game to us and then took it away from us,” Riley said said. “We had to get them in a transition game, but to do that you have to rebound, which we didn’t do.”

The Celtics finished with 61 rebounds, including 12 by Bird and 11 by Robert Parish. The Lakers had 50 rebounds, but only Maurice Lucas did his share while the game was still semi-close and wound up with 10--nine in the first half.

“We have no excuses,” Lucas said. “We weren’t on top of our game, unfortunately for us.”

Boston’s defenders put pressure on Laker ballhandlers far from the basket and prevented them from passing the ball to the other side of the court. They also clogged the middle and got back quickly on defense, leaving the Lakers nowhere to go but home.

“They have bad nights, too,” Parish said.

Laker Notes Kurt Rambis said he may be able to rejoin the Lakers for Friday night’s game with the Clippers at the Sports Arena. Rambis missed all three games on this trip because of a sprained left ankle. . . . The Lakers have lost four of their last six road games. . . . Playing on a sore left Achilles’ heel, Kevin McHale was not much of a factor for the Celtics. He shot 3 for 14, scored 12 points and had just 7 rebounds. . . . Even though there were more Patriot T-shirts being sold outside Boston Garden than Celtic T-shirts, one Larry Bird T-shirt was going pretty fast. In a cartoon on the front, Bird carried the NBA championship trophy in his claws, flying out of a bursting Forum on the left and heading for Boston Garden on the right. The T-shirt said on the other side: BRING IT BACK.