Van Gundy almost finds winner with point guard vanishing act

Freeman: Series all but over | Doyel: Finals far from done

LOS ANGELES -- Stan Van Gundy went into Game 2 of the NBA Finals second-guessing himself about how he had divided the point guard minutes in Game 1. It was too much Jameer Nelson and too little Rafer Alston.

Van Gundy solved that problem with about nine minutes left in the fourth quarter of Game 2 Sunday night. He didn't play either one of them.

At this rate, the Orlando Magic will become the first team in NBA history to bench both its point guards in the middle of the Finals. At the very least, Van Gundy is going to have to take a long, hard look at becoming perhaps the first coach to bench his starting backcourt in the middle of a championship series.

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Van Gundy has morphed into Larry Brown right before our eyes, falling in and out of love with players from one timeout to the next. And you can't blame him. When your guards shoot 6-for-26 and your team gets "crushed" -- Van Gundy's word -- by 20 turnovers, it's time to hold backcourt auditions between Games 2 and 3.

Van Gundy coached his backside off in this game, proving once and for all that he's one of the top two or three sideline tacticians in the league. From a clipboard standpoint, he's even better than his more decorated counterpart in this series, Phil Jackson. The result -- a 101-96 overtime victory for the Lakers -- doesn't add up. The Magic should've won this game, dysfunctional backcourt and all.

Orlando was trailing 69-68 with 8:50 left in the third when Van Gundy gave up on his point guards. Alston, who was 1-for-8 at the time, went to the bench. For a while, it appeared he wouldn't return to the scorer's table for the rest of the series. If you're a Magic fan, that would've been just fine.

Van Gundy went with the 6-foot-10 Hedo Turkoglu to run the offense, because nobody else could. It was a huge gamble, and it took guts, and the Lakers should consider themselves lucky because it almost worked.

• Lakers 101, Magic 96 | Series: Lakers 2, Magic 0

"You can decide how effective it was," Van Gundy said. "I thought Rafer was playing well, but they're just leaving him open on every postup and we couldn't get the ball in the basket. So we are just searching for somebody to be able to make a shot. Obviously, we didn't find anybody."

Stan Van Gundy will keep adjusting until he finds the right combination for this series. (Getty Images)

It was still a one-point deficit, 82-81, when Mickael Pietrus fouled out with 3:08 left in regulation. Van Gundy stood on the sideline with his arms folded, surveying the players on the floor. He turned around and pointed to Courtney Lee to join Turkoglu, Rashard Lewis, Dwight Howard, and J.J. Redick for the final push. Still no point guard. The two pointless guards, Alston and Nelson, stayed in their seats. It almost turned into a masterstroke from Van Gundy, the supposed "master of panic."

The play of the game -- and perhaps of the season for Orlando -- was a brilliant inbounds play drawn up by Van Gundy out of a 20-second timeout with 0.6 seconds left and the score tied at 88. The Lakers thought the lob was going to Howard, but it went instead to Lee, who lost Kobe Bryant at the free-throw line and got a clean look at a point-blank, catch-and-shoot layup. He missed off the glass, with replays showing that Pau Gasol's hand might've grazed the rim for a basket interference violation that wasn't called.

I'm not going to kill the refs for that, and the Magic didn't, either. They knew that was their chance to make the Lakers sweat.

"Honestly, it was just a brilliant play," Bryant said. "It was just a very, very smart play that he drew up. He knew my eye was more on the shooters coming up, and it was just a hell of a play by a hell of a coach."

Bryant, carrying himself with an almost morbid demeanor in these Finals, sounded like he was talking about a loss afterward. It felt that way to the Lakers, and that can be read two ways: This was the Magic's chance and they blew it, or it's a long series and they're starting to figure out how to attack the Lakers and they have the next three games at home. Time will tell.

"They have a great coach, they made great adjustments, and they busted us," Bryant said. "... So we have to make our adjustments and we have to be ready to go in Game 3, and we will be. But they will be, too."

If Van Gundy had some soul searching to do after Game 1, he has two or three times that much on his plate now. The decisions he has to make on the way home to Orlando will take every minute of the cross-country flight.

It's doubtful he'll bench Alston; Van Gundy already has said he doubts Nelson is ready for a starting role after being out four months with a shoulder tear. Plus, Nelson wasn't much more effective than Alston on Sunday night. But Van Gundy clearly is not afraid to shake things up, and the logical move to make now is to start Pietrus at shooting guard over Lee, who has been an easy target for Bryant to post up and shoot over in the first two games.

The other move that makes sense is using the only point guard on the active roster who hasn't played a single minute in the first two games: Anthony Johnson, who served capably as Alston's backup in the first three rounds of the playoffs.

The shift in playing styles between Alston and Nelson clearly is disrupting Orlando's offense, which relies on timing and quick decisions when Howard is double-teamed. As much trouble as Turkoglu's size presented for Bryant during the second half Sunday makes it a virtual no brainer to start Pietrus on him in Game 3, then move Turkoglu over if "Air France" gets into early foul trouble.

Van Gundy could get really creative -- and don't put it past him -- by unveiling the first French-Turkish starting backcourt in Finals history when the series resumes Tuesday night in Orlando. In case you haven't picked up on it yet, there's literally nothing Van Gundy won't try.

"Stan's always searching," Redick said. "He's a game-to-game guy. And until we get a win, he's going to continue to search for a lineup that produces a win."