LAKERS SNATCH 2-0 SERIES LEAD

Provident. Divine. Blessed. Whatever the Lakers are — and no doubt, Amar’e Stoudemire is home at night thumbing through his thesaurus — this much is clear through the first two games of the Western Conference finals: there is no stopping them. The Lakers jumped to a 2-0 series lead Wednesday night with a 124-112 romp over the Suns, who have provided as much resistance as a collection of Saguaro cactuses. The decisiveness of the Lakers’ victories has already begun to set Los Angeles fans’ sights past Games 3 and 4 in Phoenix, and on toward their nemesis Boston, which opened the Eastern Conference finals by winning the first two games in Orlando. Parts of the last 90 seconds were played with fans in the upper reaches of Staples Center serenading their team’s eighth consecutive playoff victory with chants of “We want Boston.” “Well, what can you say?” Phoenix Coach Alvin Gentry said as he sat down in the interview room. “We can’t slow them down. I thought we played well offensively, but every time we tried to make an adjustment to slow them down, they go somewhere else.” A little while later, as he was standing outside the locker room, he tapped into a familiar feeling from the days when he coached the Clippers. “As I said, we’re open for suggestions,” Gentry said. “We’re not going to grow in the next three days.” The first task will be figuring out a way to limit Kobe Bryant. Bryant, rejuvenated since having his swollen left knee drained late in the first-round series against Oklahoma City, torched the Suns for 40 points in the opener, when he made Hill look like he was in danger of needing another ankle operation with a crossover dribble that sent the 37-year-old stumbling backward to the floor. In Game 2, Bryant was Kobe the Facilitator. He managed 21 points, but when Phoenix sent double teams at him, Bryant eagerly moved the ball. He finished with 13 assists, the most by a Laker in the playoffs since Magic Johnson’s 13 in 1996. With the ball in his hands as the first-quarter clock ran down, Bryant started toward the basket, then passed the ball to a wide-open Ron Artest in the corner. Artest, with the crowd on its feet, made the shot as the buzzer sounded and Bryant celebrated a 36-24 lead by pointing both his index fingers at Artest. It was a point well made — if you leave the other Lakers wide open, Bryant was more than happy to put the ball in their hands. In the fourth quarter, after Phoenix had clawed back from a 14-point deficit to tie the score at 90, that meant delivering the ball to Pau Gasol, who scored 14 of his game-high 29 points in the final period — most of the time being single-covered by Stoudemire. “It’s my responsibility and Pau’s responsibility to make the defense have to do something,” Bryant said. “If they play straight up single coverage, then we’ve got to go to work. And then once the defense adjusts, it’s our responsibility to make the right play.” In the fourth quarter, that meant delivering the ball to Jordan Farmar, who hit a 3-pointer from the corner to start the period and another that boosted Los Angeles’ lead to 104-95. It came during a stretch in which the Suns turned the ball over on three consecutive possessions — including two by Steve Nash. They never got closer than 8 points after that. No matter how slick the Suns’ offense looked at times — Nash was effective in creating dunks for Stoudemire or open 3-pointers for Jared Dudley, who made five, and Jason Richardson, who had 27 points — they only rarely stopped the Lakers. In the two games of the series, the Lakers have shot 58 percent from the field. It is a familiar problem for Phoenix. When the Suns knocked the Lakers out of the playoffs in 2006 and 2007, it prompted the Lakers to retool, and they have repeatedly hammered the Suns. It was the Lakers’ ninth victory in 11 meetings since they acquired Gasol in January 2008. “We have to figure it out,” said Hill, who scored 23 points and helped lead the Suns’ third-quarter charge. “We’ve scored enough points, but they’re scoring at will. I don’t really know what the answer is.” And if the Suns were grasping for answers, they also did not have the right words. Stoudemire, who called Lamar Odom’s 19-point, 19-rebound performance in Game 1 lucky, said he did not have any regrets. Odom managed 17 points, 11 rebounds and 4 assists, and did his best to take the high road. But when asked if anyone had called him lucky before, Odom could not suppress a smile. “Yeah but I don’t think this is the time or place to go over that,” Odom said, netting the last uncontested point of the evening at the Suns’ expense.