From C.A. Clark, Silver Screen & Roll: For the briefest of moments, it was there: Hope. The belief that the Lakers had tricks up their sleeve that had not yet been revealed. For 9 glorious minutes, as the Lakers took the court against the Los Angeles Clippers, they did something previously thought to be impossible. They defended well, as a team, together. Not Dwight Howard changing shots. Not getting a couple of missed shots that lead to a big run. Just good, solid, team defense, with rotations at the proper time and to the proper place. It was a sight to behold. It was also short-lived. By the end of the first quarter, the Lakers had 6 turnovers and the Clippers were in the midst of hitting 10 straight shots, including a few threes, and the game was all but over. In the 2nd half, the 7 man rotation the Lakers have been working with of late ensured that there was little hope of any kind of grand comeback, and the Clippers kept the Lakers at arm’s length the rest of the way.

From Mark Heisler, Lakers Nation: Was this the Lakers’ playoffs? Or what if the Clippers drilled the Lakes—again–this time by 109-95—to record their first sweep over you… and they barely noticed? “For the first time ever you’ve been swept by the Clippers,” someone said to Kobe Bryant. “How frustrating is that?” Apparently not very much. Bryant paused, grinned, said wearily, “Man, we we got a bigger challenge to worry about than beating the Clippers one game.” And those were the good, old days, so to speak, around 4 p.m. Sunday with the Lakers still No. 8 in the West. About three hours later, the Jazz upset the Warriors in Oakland and the Lakers’ challenge was even bigger, going from a half-game ahead of Utah to a half-game behind… which is effectively 1.5 games with the Jazz having won the season series.

From Arash Markaz, ESPN LA: Los Angeles Lakers forward Metta World Peace said he will start Tuesday night when the Lakers play the New Orleans Hornets, just 12 days after undergoing surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his left knee that was supposed to sideline him at least six weeks. World Peace participated in a three-on-three scrimmage at practice Monday, and Lakers coach Mike D’Antoni said there was a 90 percent chance World Peace would play Tuesday. “He’s good,” D’Antoni said. “It’s probably a game-time decision, but he looks good. He’s raring to go. The medical staff will make a decision tomorrow. It’s unbelievable. He’s different. … I’ve never seen this before.”

From Mike Bresnahan, LA Times: If ever there’s a time for the Lakers to sweep a back-to-back set, it’s now. Age and injuries could always be blamed, but inconsistency would be the biggest, saddest mark of a team that hasn’t won on back-to-back days this season. “It’s a good time to start,” Kobe Bryant said Monday. The Lakers have never gone a whole season without sweeping a back-to-back series in their 64-year history. Even their worst team, the 1957-58 Minneapolis Lakers who finished 19-53, managed to nail a back-to-back. The maligned present-day Lakers (40-37) play host to New Orleans on Tuesday and then are at Portland, their personal haunted mansion, on Wednesday. In the mess that this season has become, a surprising bit of positive injury news trickled out of the Lakers’ medical flies Monday.

From Kurt Helin, Pro Basketball Talk: Such is the depth of the hole the Lakers have dug themselves — even in the sprint to the finish to get the eighth and final playoff spot in the West Los Angeles does not control its own destiny. Utah is the team in the driver’s seat. Win out their remaining four games and the Jazz head to the playoffs. It doesn’t matter how many points Kobe Bryant scores or how fast Metta World Peace comes back from injury, if the Jazz win out the Lakers can do no better than tie and Utah has the tie breaker (they won the season series). The Lakers still have a chance, but they likely need to go at least 4-1 in their last five to get there. They may need to win out. And their schedule is anything but easy.

From Michael Jones, Yahoo Sports: It wasn’t supposed to be this difficult — the Los Angeles Lakers were one of the NBA’s elite teams from the onset of the 2012-13 season. But in 48 minutes during Sunday’s loss to the Los Angeles Clippers, the Lakers may have seen their season come to a premature end. That’s because the Clips clinched the Pacific Division and knocked the purple and gold out of the coveted eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference by defeating them,109-95. To make matters worse, the Utah Jazz beat the Golden State Warriors to overtake the Lakers in the standings and hold a half-game lead going into Monday. Since Utah holds the tiebreaker, the Lakers are looking at an uphill battle. That battle, which includes games at Portland and vs. the Houston Rockets, San Antonio Spurs and Golden State Warriors, wouldn’t be relevant if it weren’t for the stellar campaign of Kobe Bryant.

From Ramona Shelburne, ESPN LA: Los Angeles Lakers coach Mike D’Antoni knows the risk of playing Kobe Bryant as many minutes as he has during the past four games. He also knows the risks of not using the Lakers’ best player as much as possible as the team frantically tries to make the playoffs. “We’re playing a little bit with fire,” D’Antoni said of Bryant, who has played 46 minutes a game the past four games. “We wouldn’t like to but we put ourselves in the position we have to. “We’re short-handed right now and we’re playing it very tight. Normally this wouldn’t happen but we put ourselves in a hole and Kobe is our best bet going forward to win games. He said he’s going to retire after a year so we’re going to get our money’s worth for two years. I don’t know what to tell you.”

From Suki Thind, Lakers Nation: At the beginning of the season, nobody would have guessed that the Lakers would be fighting for the eighth and final playoff berth in the Western Conference. Well, unfortunately, that’s the reality and things are looking grim for the Lakers following a loss to the Los Angeles Clippers on Sunday and a win by the Utah Jazz over the Golden State Warriors. Currently, the Jazz are in the eighth playoff slot and, as many of you know, hold the tiebreaker over the Lakers should the two teams finish with identical records. For edification, the Lakers are currently a half game behind the Utah Jazz with a record of 40-37; the Jazz have a record of 41-37. Basically, what this means is that the Lakers have absolutely no wiggle room to lose a game over their remaining five; barring a complete collapse by the Jazz.

From Melissa Rohlin, LA Times: After the Lakers lost to the Clippers, Dwight Howard was noticeably upset. He looked down at the ground. He didn’t smile. And his responses to reporters’ questions were extremely terse. “You seem upset,” said a reporter. Responded Howard: “Just getting ready for tomorrow; have a good practice; come back for the game.” A short while later Howard was prodded again. “Are you upset, mad, disappointed — which one is it right now?” Said Howard: “Can we ask some more questions?” Howard was not much in the mood to talk about anything after the Lakers fell to the Clippers, 109-95, on Sunday afternoon, getting swept by their Staples Center neighbor for the first time since Donald Sterling bought them in 1981. When asked to rate the Lakers’ intensity in the game, Howard balked. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t have a rate meter. I don’t know. Sorry.”

From Drew Garrison, Silver Screen & Roll: It’s been a long and winding season for the Los Angeles Lakers. One could argue that the highest point of the season came before a single game was played on the hardwood. Before the preseason, before media day, and before the group had ever gathered in Southern California. The Summer of Dwight Howard and Steve Nash was many, many losses ago and many, many disappointments ago, but was a moment of jubilation. It’s been all downhill from there. What goes up…It didn’t just come down, though, for the Lakers throughout the season. It was a storm that has left them shipwrecked miles off the pacific coast, hanging onto a few floating pieces of debris as they tread water, hoping they make it back to shore. There’s blood in the water, the sharks are hungry, and there are five games left for those bullies of the ocean to maul what remains of the 2012-2013 Lakers.

From Mark Heisler, Lakers Nation: They went down to the crossroads, fell down on their knees, and who came by? Ho, ho, ho…He was huge, he was round but no, he wasn’t Fat Albert, even if there was enough of a resemblance for Dallas owner Mark Cuban to put him on their scoreboard screen with the Lakers in town. Not that Shaquille O’Neal, whose sense of humor was one of his best attributes, minded. He was laughing as much as anyone. Yes, it was Shaq. The Lakers’ big fond memory, returning to the Staples Center he helped build in the flesh, all 350 pounds of it, to have his No. 34 jersey retired and remind everyone of better times.

From Brett Polakoff, Pro Basketball Talk: When the Lakers retired the jersey of Shaquille O’Neal in a halftime ceremony on Tuesday, something appeared to be off with the replica that was unveiled on the wall of the Staples Center, hanging alongside the rest of the retired numbers of the all-time great Lakers. O’Neal’s name and number were incorrectly emblazoned on the front of the jersey, as first noticed publicly by well-respected investigative journalist Trey Kerby of The Basketball Jones. The equally intrepid Dan Devine of Yahoo!’s Ball Don’t Lie took it a step further, and confirmed Kerby’s observation as being fact with Lakers spokesman, John Black. Since then, the Lakers have said that the team expects to have the replacement jersey in place before tip-off Friday night at Staples when the Lakers will host the Memphis Grizzlies, according to Mark Medina of theLos Angeles Daily News.

From Ben Bolch, LA Times: A slightly less heralded Laker nudged his way into the spotlight Tuesday night alongside Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant and Phil Jackson. His name is Earl Clark, and his fame in NBA circles is burgeoning. “You saw the game,” veteran Dallas guard Vince Carter said after Clark helped the Lakers emerge with a 101-81 victory over the Mavericks at Staples Center. “He did everything. He was as big as their stars.” Clark had 17 points, 12 rebounds and a career-high five blocks, the forward reappearing in a big way after a string of mostly forgettable performances since his midseason breakthrough. It was the most rebounds he had collected in more than a month. It was the most points he had scored in nearly two months.

From Drew Garrison, Silver Screen & Roll:  Dwight Howard’s defense has vastly improved since the All-Star break. The once plodding along big man is spry again, looking much like the defensive player of the year he once was. While the Los Angeles Lakers battle for a spot in the playoffs, there’s still a season beyond 2012-2013 to worry about, and Howard has made it clear that there’s every reason to believe he can continue his path to being a healthy All-World defender once again. He’s running the floor in transition, he’s destroying pick and rolls, he’s covering a ton of ground. When the Lakers played the Sacramento Kings it was most noticeable as he moved like a lunatic covering as much ground as we’ve seen any Lakers defender in the last few years.

From Dave McMenamin, ESPN LA:  Kobe Bryant will always be associated with the number 81, and with good reason. But here are two more digits tied to Bryant that are just as eye-popping: 79. As in 79 seconds, the total amount of time Bryant has sat in the Los Angeles Lakers’ last two games — both wins — coming just shy of going the distance and playing the maximum 96 minutes. Bryant scoring in the 80s as a 27-year-old was one thing. But to play two entire games in a row as a 34-year-old nursing a bum left ankle that exacerbated a bone spur in his left foot? And then to not only play that much time, but to average 21 points, 12.5 assists, 10 rebounds, three steals and one blocked shot? Well, that’s another thing altogether.

From Drew Garrison, Silver Screen & Roll: The puzzle of playing Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol has been a daunting one for the Los Angeles Lakers, both offensively and defensively. While it’s clear that Gasol does not have the foot speed to defend many power forwards, he still has the ability to play as a “stretch” four in the sense that he is still considered a threat from the mid-range and his ability to read the defense and make the right pass is top-notch. The thing is, this puzzle was figured out long ago. When Steve Nash came back from his fibula injury in December the Lakers were running HORNS sets and they were working like a charm. As they pulled further and further from December, they seemed to drift just as far away from running the versatile set.

From Ben Bolch, LA Times: If Shaquille O’Neal needed a nickname on his first day as a Laker, it could have been the Big Worrywart. As dominant as he was, the best big man in the NBA recognized he represented just a fraction of the Lakerscenters who had come before him. George Mikan won six titles while becoming Mr. Basketball.Wilt Chamberlain won two titles (one as a Laker) and scored 100 points in a game. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won six titles (five as a Laker) and was the league’s all-time leading scorer. What had O’Neal done, besides help the Orlando Magic go poof in a four-game sweep during the 1995 Finals? “It was something I was terrified of,” O’Neal said of the Lakers’ legacy of centers. “We made it to the Finals that one year. That was good, but it wasn’t as good as them yet. Because in my mind I’m like, ‘Wilt’s got two [titles], Kareem’s got six and I have none.’”

From Jabari Davis, Lakers Nation: Earlier this season, I wrote what some would consider to be a ‘scathing’ article about Shaquille O’Neal’s seeminglypersonal issues with newly-acquired superstar big man, Dwight Howard. As I stated in the previous article, honest assessments and criticisms are entirely fair and precisely what we tune in to TNT’s Inside The NBA for. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to be what was taking place at the time, and I was immediately concerned with how things would play out during O’Neal’s eventual jersey retirement ceremony.

From Kurt Helin, Pro Basketball Talk: When Kobe Bryant got ring number five, he couldn’t hide his glee at having more rings than his rival Shaquille O’Neal — he talked about it in his press conference minutes after the game ended. Now, on the day the Lakers will retire Shaquille O’Neal’s jersey, Kobe told Marc Spears of Yahoo that he likes to remind the big man who has more hardware.“I always remind him every time I see him,” Bryant, who’s won five championships with the Lakers, told Yahoo! Sports. “I saw him after the All-Star Game and said, ‘How you doing, ‘Four’ ?’ He said, ‘Oh, you [expletive].’ [Our relationship is] really good now. We have such a mutual respect for each other.”

From Dave McMenamin, ESPN LA: When the Los Angeles Lakers welcomed Dwight Howard to the practice facility for the first time this summer, general manager Mitch Kupchak pointed out the window of his office to the retired jerseys over the court and said he wanted Howard to be recognized there someday. Another “Superman” will already be up there if that happens for Howard. The Lakers are retiring Shaquille O’Neal’s No. 34 during their game against the Dallas Mavericks on Tuesday. While Howard and O’Neal have publicly traded barbs in the past, including Howard saying O’Neal was “done” and “it’s time to move on” after O’Neal had criticized him at the beginning of training camp this season, Howard had nothing but praise for O’Neal on this occasion.

From Zach Harper, CBS Sports: Only three players in NBA history have scored more points than Kobe Bryant. Other than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone and Michael Jordan, Bryant has outscored thousands and thousands of players who have laced up sneakers and put on a jersey in the NBA. We know Kobe is going to pass Michael Jordan’s career total. But if he’s going to approach Karl Malone’s career total and take a stab at becoming the all-time leading scorer in the NBA by passing Kareem, he’s going to have to play beyond his current contract that is up in the summer of 2014. And Kobe’s decision on playing beyond his current contract, when he’ll be 36 years old and 18 seasons deep into his NBA career, is something that he’ll be prepared to make this summer.

From Ben R, Silver Screen & Roll: Don’t lie: you all thought that the Lakers were done after the first quarter. Their offensive flow wasn’t bad, but they couldn’t stop theKings in any aspect whatsoever on defense, an unsurprising development considering that the Lakers’ best perimeter defender in Metta World Peace was absent. The Kings, usually a doormat in the conference, had the league’s best offense since the All-Star break, and the Lakers were in no position to do much to deter that attack. Without MWP, the Lakers have precisely one plus defender in Dwight Howard and a defensive lineup typified by apathy (Kobe Bryant), a lack of size (Jodie Meeks), and limited mobility (Pau Gasol). And even Dwight, after showing that he had been on an upward trend in his recovery from back surgery, was not yet at the dominant level he displayed in Orlando to avert…whoops.

From Kevin Ding, OC Register: This bone spur in Kobe Bryant’s left foot? He has had it for years. Years. He has played through it for years without publicizing it and the challenges it has prompted him to overcome. Think about that the next time anyone says Bryant’s toughness, focus or drive for greatness is overdramatized. Whether Bryant now chooses to detail the specifics of the bone spur, it’s incredibly appropriate that on his latest historic night – passing Wilt Chamberlain for No. 4 on the NBA all-time scoring list Saturday in Sacramento – he played all but 22.6 seconds of the game just two days after the bone spur prompted a wheelchair to be requested for him to leave Milwaukee’s Bradley Center. (He didn’t use it.) Bryant could still have offseason surgery to remove the spur, but bear in mind this is the guy who never did have surgery on that mangled right pinky finger in 2008 or that arthritic right index finger in 2010. He figures out a way around it and goes to the ends of the earth to analyze the best course of treatment with the least time on the court lost – so he can maximize his job performance (and championship odds). This is all a roundabout way to get to the Lakers’ next man of the hour: Shaquille O’Neal, who will be rightly honored Tuesday night at Staples Center with the retirement of his No. 34 Lakers jersey.

From Dave McMenamin, ESPN LA: Move over Big Dipper. Make way for the Black Mamba. Kobe Bryant moved into fourth place on the NBA’s all-time scoring list in the Los Angeles Lakers’ game against the Sacramento Kings, passing Wilt Chamberlain. Bryant’s pull-up jumper from the foul line with 7:55 remaining in the second quarter gave Bryant 31,421 points for his career, edging past Chamberlain’s 31,419 total. ”What a journey,” Bryant said after scoring 19 points and handing out 14 assists, one shy of his career high, in the Lakers’ 103-98 win over the Kings. “It’s been a very, very long journey. I’m certainly extremely appreciative of all the support and the Laker faithful, the ‘Laker Nation,’ from being a 17-year-old kid to a 34-year-old man and all the support they’ve given me throughout my career.”

From Mike Bresnahan, LA Times: Lakers fans were well aware that Steve Nash missed a ton of time when the season began. And Pau Gasol was sidelined by a variety of injuries. And more recently, Metta World Peace wouldn’t be back until the Western Conference semifinals, as if the Lakers — or their followers — were thinking that far ahead. But Coach Mike D’Antoni often points out the least-analyzed injury of the Lakers’ season — Steve Blake missing 37 games because of abdominal surgery and subsequent groin soreness. Blake just completed his best month in three seasons with the Lakers, and he’ll be counted on for more production as Nash struggles with hamstring and hip soreness.