“I don’t normally dress like this, but after a game like that I just might.”

The extent of Yao’s injury was not known until Saturday evening, and it left the Rockets floored. They had figured to lose him for perhaps one game, because of an ankle sprain.

“You can’t underestimate, when everybody heard the news about Yao, that’s a pretty big blow to a team,” Coach Rick Adelman said. “I think these guys responded in the right way.”

Turnovers sank the Rockets in Game 3. This time, the Lakers gave the ball away nine times in the first half, leading to 17 points for the Rockets, which accounted for most of the 54-36 advantage at halftime. Battier paced Houston early, making his first four shots.

“They shot the ball extremely well,” Bryant said. “We couldn’t recover from it.”

Bryant dismissed suggestions that the Lakers had underestimated the Rockets but conceded that the Lakers, who had a chance to take a commanding 3-1 lead, had missed a great opportunity.

“I’ve been on teams that made this dumb mistake before,” Bryant said. “I’ve been on teams that won championships that blew 2-0 leads, blew 3-1 leads and had to go to seven games and stuff like that. It’s just a part of the game. You’re not going to learn until you actually go through it.”

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