Too Much Ado About Winning?

INDIANAPOLIS — While Glen Rice has maintained a general silence about his impending free-agent status and his feelings about playing with the Lakers, his wife, Christina, in an interview with a Charlotte-area newspaper, did not disavow the notion that he is likely to head elsewhere after the season.

She said that, after coming to the Lakers in a trade from Charlotte last season, her husband has found it difficult, especially in Phil Jackson’s triangle offense, as his statistics have fallen to the lowest points of his career.

“It’s been extremely tough for him,” Christina Rice told the Winston- Salem (N.C.) Journal. “It’s probably the hardest thing he’s ever had to deal with in his carer.

“I don’t think it bothered him that he wasn’t going the go-to guy any more, but it went all the way to the opposite extreme. He went from being the first option in Charlotte to not being an option at all, almost.”

Christina Rice also said that Rice does not feel as much a part of the Lakers team as he did in Charlotte and before that in Miami.

With the Lakers, she said, the only focus is on winning games.

“There is not communication here,” Christina Rice said. “The guys are good guys, they’re friendly and everything. But it’s not like in Miami or Charlotte, where being part of the team was everything. . . .

“He enjoys the winning. The winning is fun. But it’s like, that’s all there is for any of them, just the winning. I mean, they’re a great bunch of guys. But all they have is winning.

“Glen’s not going to come out and complain about anything, that’s not his personality. He wants a championship ring a lot. But it’s like, he’s just waiting for his time to come.”

Rice, who was upset that the team exercised a $7-million option for this season, has been telling teammates for months that he does not expect to return to the Lakers, and Jackson, certainly, has not signaled that he would be concerned about losing the 33-year-old.

“I think Glen belongs on the East Coast,” Christina Rice said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen.

“But if he could come out here and get his championship ring and then go back to the East Coast, I think he would be happy. And I think there are a lot of teams on the East Coast that he could play a major role for.”

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The flagrant foul called on Shaquille O’Neal during Game 2 on Friday was downgraded to a regular foul Sunday by Stu Jackson, the new NBA senior vice president.

Though the Pacers turned the call--which gave them two free throws plus the ball--into a four-point play, the reclassification means that O’Neal is back at zero points in the flagrant-foul playoff tally.

A player is suspended for one playoff game if he accumulates four flagrant fouls.

Jackson, who protested the call right after it was made and then after the game, said he asked the Laker front office to ask the league about the call.

“I asked [General Manager] Mitch Kupchak, he volunteered to call, find out how they graded it and judged it themselves,” Jackson said.

Said O’Neal: “Thanks, Stu.”

When told that Jackson initiated the reevaluation: “Oh, thanks Phil.”

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Before Game 3, Jackson acknowledged that the Lakers are having a difficult time with Pacer forward Austin Croshere, who came off the bench to average 20 points and six rebounds in the first two games, and suggested that the Lakers will use another defender to try to keep him from having such a large impact.

“He has had a lot of success,” Jackson said of Croshere. “It’s just a matchup, I think, that is going to be problematic right now.

“Right now, Rice and [Robert] Horry and [Rick] Fox have been the three that have played him.

“We may have to find another matchup.”

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Guard Derek Fisher had one of the best big games of his Laker career (10 points, 10 assists in 27 minutes), but he was still disappointed that he allowed Pacer point guard Travis Best to break loose for some crucial baskets in the late going.

“Tonight, I got a chance to knock some shots down, but wasn’t as effective defensively as I had been in the first two games,” said Fisher, who is being sent into the game every time Best checks in--a direct matchup to contain the speedy point guard.

“He’s a good player, so you know, I can’t shut him down completely. But I have to consistently figure out a way to make it harder for him to score.

“Tonight, coming home, he felt a little more comfortable, knocked some shots down in the first half, and his points are huge.”

In Games 1 and 2 at Staples Center, Best made only two of his 10 field-goal tries, and scored six total points. On Sunday, Best made five of seven shots, both of his three-point tries, and scored 14 points.