"We had a lot of great opportunities," said Chauncey Billups... . "It's kind of disappointing."

Here's the irony: It was the Lakers who wore down the Nuggets with their energy in the second half, rather than the other way around. All series long we've wondered about the cumulative impact of the heavy minutes that Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol are playing, especially in the wake of a tough seven-game series with Houston. But when the Nuggets opened up a lead, L.A. started trapping, and for the first time this series Denver flinched instead of remaining the aggressor.

From the 7:37 mark of the third until the 7:52 mark of the fourth -- a span of nearly a full quarter -- Denver mustered only five points. That was a span of 19 trips in which they saw a seven-point lead became an 11-point deficit, and the Nuggets never recovered.

"We kind of sat back as a team," said Billups, "instead of running to the ball to get it and try to make a play. They got aggressive and we got passive in that stretch, that was what turned the tide."

"They stepped up the pressure a little bit, they trapped harder. I had two straight turnovers where they stepped up and trapped the ball really hard. And our guys, we kind of ran away from the ball. After we made an adjustment we didn't turn it over any more, but that was a crucial point in the game."

The turnovers also fueled the Lakers' offense, not to mention the crowd. The first of Billups' turnovers led to a monstrous dunk by Shannon Brown over Chris Andersen that nearly blew the roof off Staples Center and lifted the weary Lakers into a frenzy that propelled them to victory (forget the polite golf-claps from last year's Finals; this place was rocking).

"Some of those stops I was amazed at," said Phil Jackson. "We left guys open for shots [but] we were still able to recover to get back. We had blocks at the basket, we had rebounds and I thought they were up for grabs that we came down with."

Let's break it down. In those 19 trips Denver took 18 shots and made two, and threw in five turnovers for good measure. They missed some open looks, to be sure, but also made some incredibly bad decisions. Billups uncharacteristically threw away two passes, while nine of the 18 shots came from the three guys the Lakers enthusiastically encourage to shoot -- Dahntay Jones, Kenyon Martin and Chris Andersen. A 10th was basically Martin's too, as the shot clock went off with his trying to make a move at the top of the key.

Another crucial play in that stretch was the fifth foul on Nene early in the fourth quarter, an offensive foul when he was trying to post up against Pau Gasol. The Nuggets were furious about what looked like a pretty tame push, and Nene picked up a technical arguing the call.

But left unanswered was why exactly they were going to Nene in the first place. Already in the midst of a massive offensive drought, they were force-feeding a fourth option who hadn't been able to score against Gasol all series.

If the Nuggets had run something different, they might have been better able to stem the tide of interior L.A. baskets that allowed them to pull away in the fourth.

Wait, it gets worse. The Nuggets' 11 minutes of ineptitude also included a hard foul on Kobe Bryant by Carmelo Anthony that may be reviewed by the league; though he appeared to get Bryant high across the shoulders, it could be ruled the dreaded "above the shoulders" foul, which would result in an automatic one-game suspension for the must-win Game 6 in Denver on Friday.

Regardless of what the league office decides (my guess is they won't issue any penalty), the Nuggets have to lament the fact that they had a great opportunity to steal a game in Staples before their offensive melted down in the second half.

In addition to the turnovers and poor shot selection, there were also some easier looks they couldn't find the range on. Late in the fourth quarter, for instance, the Nuggets missed a great chance to make a final charge when Billups and J.R. Smith (1-of-10 on 3s) missed wide-open triples on consecutive trips.

To read the entire Hollinger column, click here.

LOS ANGELES -- In his pregame remarks, Lakers coach Phil Jackson alluded to the 1975 NBA champion Golden State Warriors as a template of what he's trying to achieve with his sometimes unpredictable team.

"[The Warriors] had 11 guys playing on their 12-man roster," Jackson said. "I haven't seen a team quite like that since that's been able to play consistent basketball. But they were able to find roles for all those players. We're trying to find roles for 10 guys."

That's a telling admission for a No. 1 seed that's 17 games into its playoff run. Even though the Lakers won 65 games in the regular season, they've looked like a team still trying to find its identity in the postseason.

The Warriors team referenced by Jackson featured Rick Barry and a roster of well-defined role players who spread the ball around. On Wednesday night, the Lakers finally achieved that kind of balance for the first time in the conference finals against Denver.

"I think this was one of our best games that we played this year, as far as the team effort," Lakers forward Lamar Odom said. "We used everything we had to win the basketball game."

Any evaluation of a Lakers' team effort starts with a look at Kobe Bryant. The Lakers' guard scored a team-high 22 points -- far below his playoff average. He dished out eight assists -- also a team high. The Lakers scored 19 points off Bryant passes. The average for the first four games of the series? Only 10.

"I just tried to beat [Denver] with my passing," Bryant said. "We stretched the defense out a lot more. We put the ball in my hands, put the ball in [Pau Gasol's] hands, and made guys commit and made the plays from there."

Bryant's performance Wednesday night stood in stark contrast to Game 4 in Denver, when he dominated the ball in a stagnant Lakers' offense. A sample of Bryant's generosity came at the close of the first half. With the clock winding down, Bryant drove down the gut of the lane, only to kick the ball out with four seconds left to a wide open Sasha Vujacic. The struggling Lakers guard drained a 3-pointer to tie the game going into halftime.

"We did a great job of realizing how they were loading the defense, especially keying in on Kobe," Lakers forward Luke Walton said. "When they double him, we get a play on a 4-on-3 advantage on the rest of the court."

When Jackson looked at the box score following the game, he had to flash a smile (a reserved one, of course) at the shot distribution. Eight different Lakers attempted between five and 15 shots, and the team recorded 25 assists on 37 field goals. Bryant, Odom, Gasol, Derek Fisher and Trevor Ariza all finished in double figures. The ball really started to move early in the fourth quarter when Jackson put one of his best passing units on the floor with Bryant, Odom, Gasol, Walton and Shannon Brown.

"We came out to start that fourth with a lot of energy," Walton said. "We said, 'This is our time right now.'"

No play exemplified the Lakers' unselfishness and fluid ball movement more than their last field goal of the night. Nursing a five-point lead with a little more than a minute remaining, the Lakers worked the ball around the perimeter with a beautiful reversal. With the shot clock winding down, the rock landed in Bryant's hands. He elevated for a 3-point attempt, but on his way up, Bryant instead decided to hit an open Odom under the basket for a layup and the foul.

"Kobe did an unbelievable job of getting everyone else involved," Walton said. "He had a lot of faith in his teammates tonight."