HOUSTON — The winding story of the Houston Rockets’ season has rarely made room for logic, linear thinking or any standard notions of cause and effect. Star players disappear, expectations sink and the Rockets surge.

So when Yao Ming traded his red jersey for a dark suit Sunday, the Rockets simply followed their own well-worn script, defying the odds and stunning the Los Angeles Lakers with a 99-87 victory.

Yao was declared out for the rest of the playoffs on Saturday evening, after doctors discovered a hairline fracture in his left foot. The Rockets’ championship dreams figured to go with him. But they have tied this Western Conference semifinal series at 2-2 and have already won a game at Staples Center, the site of Game 5 on Tuesday.

“We don’t ever count ourselves out,” said the speedy guard Aaron Brooks, who led the Rockets with a career playoff-high 34 points. “We’ve been through a lot this year.”

Before they lost Yao, their franchise center, the Rockets lost Tracy McGrady, their All-Star guard, to season-ending knee surgery in February. They lost Yao’s backup, Dikembe Mutombo, to a leg injury in the first round of the playoffs.

“It’s the same thing,” Brooks said, making the adjustments sound routine. “We’ve been playing like that and we’re used to it.”

The game was not nearly as close as the final score indicated. The Rockets, who also got a career playoff-high 23 points from Shane Battier, led by double digits for the final 43 minutes, the margin getting as large as 29 points.

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