Magic Is Forced to Think Big : Lakers: Johnson struggles against 7-3 Breuer but still paces club to its eighth victory in a row, 83-73.

MINNEAPOLIS — In a game in need of entertainment value, Minnesota Timberwolves Coach Bill Musselman assigned 7-foot-3 Randy Breuer to guard Magic Johnson. Until Muggsy Bogues lines up at Magic’s knee, or Manute Bol wobbles up to him, you won’t see anything stranger.

Did Musselman think Johnson might fall over laughing? Johnson kept his mirth to himself but took an uncharacteristic 22 shots. He missed 16 of them but recovered to score 21 points, rallying the Lakers to an 83-73 victory Thursday night, their eighth in a row.

This is what can happen when a true obsessive with a great imagination is presented with an insoluble problem. Did Musselman arrive at this plan in a dream? A vision? A hallucination?

Actually, it was a videotape of the Lakers’ rout of the Detroit Pistons on Tuesday.

“They must have posted him (Johnson) up 10 times,” Musselman said.

What did Breuer think when presented with the mission?

“Actually, I thought I had overslept this morning and it was April 1,” Breuer said. “I thought Bill was pulling my leg for a while, but he wasn’t.”

And Johnson?

“Well, the first time, I just looked,” Johnson said, smiling. “I thought, ‘Maybe it’s just off the center jump.’ Then I come down the next two-three times and, ‘Oh, he’s guarding me.’

“It didn’t concern me at first because we had a game plan. Then you say, ‘Wait a minute! I got a big man on me! That’s not supposed to happen!’ ”

The Laker plan was to run and not get sucked into the quagmire Musselman calls a tempo.

They were successful at first, ripping to a 15-2 lead. They were less successful after that. The game became a half-court shootout with Johnson probing Breuer’s weaknesses.

Let’s see, Johnson could take him on the right, or the left, or he could shoot over him, since Breuer’s lack of speed meant he couldn’t get any closer than five feet.

“The only person who could ever stop Magic is Magic himself,” Breuer said. “Magic can do what he wants with me guarding him. I can’t stop him.

“I don’t know if I was at his mercy. I basically knew if he started hitting jump shots, I’d be in a lot of trouble.

“For a person who can’t react, I did a pretty good job, didn’t I? He couldn’t believe what we were trying to do.”

Johnson tried some long one-handers. And missed. He also missed right-handed hooks, left-handed hooks, right-handed layups, left-handed layups and reverse layups, not to mention all five three-point attempts he tried.

At one point, he was four for 15. He could have pulled a muscle in his neck, from all the shaking of his head he did.

“Well, you know, it was a situation I was too anxious to go,” Johnson said, still smiling, “and once I got there, I couldn’t hit a thing.

“I went by him a lot of times, but I couldn’t finish the play. Sometimes I did. Most of the time, I didn’t.”

The Lakers led after one quarter, 28-14, but then the game slowed to a crawl. Check your VCRs, it might have actually gone into reverse. The Timberwolves scored 22 points in the second quarter, 21 in the third . . . and tied it, 57-57.

But the Lakers scored the first seven points in the fourth quarter, five by Sam Perkins. Perkins had 11 in the quarter and the Timberwolves never got closer than five again.

“It was a cute tactic,” Laker Coach Mike Dunleavy said. “Yeah, I was surprised. But I wouldn’t mind a steady diet of it.”

Said Johnson: “Next game that happens, I’ll be better prepared. They caught me off guard. The whole team’s going, ‘What’s happening here?’ ”

The Lakers play the Jazz tonight.

Mark Eaton, anyone?

Laker Notes

Mike Dunleavy wanted to rest his starters for tonight’s game, but couldn’t secure this one. Magic Johnson played 41 minutes and didn’t leave the floor in the second half until the closing seconds. Sam Perkins went 43, James Worthy 38. Said Dunleavy: “I left the starters in longer in the first period. I wanted to go for a knockout punch.” . . . Byron Scott shot four for five and is 24 for 29 in his past three games. . . . The Timberwolves failed to score 80 points for the third time in four games. Pooh Richardson, who recently blasted Coach Bill Musselman, asked if offensive changes are needed: “Do you think the offense should be changed? I’m asking you a question. Sure I want to get up and run down the floor. That’s what I’m best at.” . . . In their eight-game streak, Lakers have allowed opponents 94 points a game, out-rebounded them by eight a game, won by an average of 18 points.