Bryant, Gasol and Fisher Expected to Play All 82

The Cleveland Cavaliers have nearly secured home-court advantage throughout the playoffs and if they win tonight at Indiana they clinch the NBA’s best record, leaving the Lakers with an almost useless home game against Utah on Tuesday. Lakers’ Coach Phil Jackson maintained he wouldn’t rest Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol or Derek Fisher in the regular-season finale against any team, telling the L.A. Times, “I don’t think of sitting players. I don’t think that’s the right thing to do when people buy season tickets and special-game tickets and things like that, and the league has asked us not to do that.”

Bryant, Fisher and Trevor Ariza will have played all 82 regular-season games if they play Tuesday, as Jackson confirmed: “I have players that are going to play their 82nd game this week, hopefully, and that’s a big milestone in this game, to have played them all.” The Portland Trail-Blazers are under investigation by the NBA for its activities before last Friday’s game against the Lakers. Jackson, who told the Times, “You want the referees able to do a job in an atmosphere that’s still fan-favorite but yet not derorgatory or not incited,” was irritated that Portland showed a video of Ariza’s flagrant foul from a Lakers-Trail Blazers game last month. The NBA will decide whether Portland will be fined today.

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