Los Angeles - Trevor Ariza received his ring, and the Houston Rockets got a big hand from Aaron Brooks to run circles around the defending NBA Champions. Brooks poured in a career-high 33 points, including five three-pointers, and the visiting Rockets dominated the second half to beat the LA Lakers 101-91 on Sunday night.
Prior to tipoff, Ariza carried his young son to midcourt, where he was presented his championship ring by former teammates Derek Fisher and Kobe Bryant to a standing ovation by the Staples Centre fans.
"It's nice to know the fans appreciate what I have done here,' said Ariza, who finished with nine points. "There's no crying in basketball, but I almost lost it. This is probably one of the best moments in my career. I got my ring and we won."
Australian centre David Andersen scored a career-best high 19, Carl Landry added 15 for Houston (6-4), which held the Lakers to 38 per cent field goal shooting and dominated the boards 60-38, to avenge a 103-102 overtime home loss earlier this month.
"Tonight's a big win and I feel good about it," Andersen said. "I contributed as much as I could, but we have to keep working to get more wins."
Ron Artest, who swapped teams with fellow-free agent Ariza in July, scored 22 points, and Andrew Bynum had 21 with 11 rebounds for the Lakers (7-3), losers of two straight after winning six in a row.
"It's transition defence," said Bryant, who finished with 18 points on 5-of-20 shooting before re-aggravating a right groin strain. "Once you give a team easy opportunities their confidence gets higher.
"Their basket gets bigger. Their three point shots fall a bit more easily. We got to do a better job stopping them from getting easy points and just holding them down."
Smarting over a 105-79 road blowout to the Denver Nuggets on Friday, the Lakers opened on a 16-2 run. However, Brooks scored 15, and Anderson added 13 in the second period as the lead was sliced to 54-52 at intermission.
Similar to game against the Nuggets, the Lakers didn't come out well and didn't have the fire in the third quarter as Brooks took control.
The speedy guard scored 13 points to spark a decisive 15-3 run. He made an old fashion three-point play, hit three consecutive threes, including one in which he was fouled and added the free throw for a four-point play, that turned a four-point deficit into a 76-68 advantage.
"Aaron was terrific, he made some long threes," Rockets coach Rick Adelman said. "We have to take shots like that because we don't have the inside game that those guys do. Aaron has all the ability in the world to put a run together like that."
Houston carried an 80-73 cushion into the final frame, increased it to 13 as Andersen opened with six straight points and never allowed the Lakers to pull to within eight.
"Aaron was hot all game long, but we lost because we came out soft again in the third quarter," Bynum said. "Our defensive intensity was not there. We weren't playing smart, everybody's playing all over the place and we have to fix that."
Elsewhere: Dallas Mavericks 95, Detroit Pistons 90 German wunderkind Dirk Nowitzki scored 25 points, including the go-ahead three-point play midway through the final quarter, helping the visiting Mavericks put the brakes on the Pistons' three-game winning streak.
Rookie Rodrigue Beaubois netted 14 points on 6-of-6 shooting for Dallas (7-3), while Drew Gooden finished with 11 and 11 rebounds.
Rodney Stuckey paced Detroit (5-5) with 28 points, and Will Bynum added 27 off the bench, including 17 in the final quarter.
Phoenix Suns 101, Toronto Raptors 100 Steve Nash had 23 points, nine assists and the game-winning three-point play with 38 seconds remaining, lifting the Suns past the visiting Raptors for the 11th consecutive time.
Amare Stoudemire scored 30 points, Channing Frye added 20 with six three-pointers as league-best Phoenix (9-2) extended its home winning streak to 13 games.
Chris Bosh topped Toronto (5-5) with 25 points and 10 rebounds, while Turkish native Hedo Turkoglu scored 20.
LA Clippers 101, Oklahoma City Thunder 93 Chris Kaman scored 25 points, Baron Davis added 24, including a key three-pointer with 43 seconds remaining, and the visiting Clippers (4-7) ended a three-game slide.
Kevin Durant had 40 points, while Russell Westbrook added 17, nine rebounds and seven assists for Oklahoma City (5-5)which beat the Clippers earlier in the week.
