"Thoroughly embarrassed. Utterly embarrassing.

The two-time defending champions now former two-time defending champions. Swept from the playoffs. In the second round. By a final score of 122-86.

Before it was over Sunday, the Lakers had more players ejected (two) than legitimate answers for the Mavericks (zero).

"It's like when you're 13, 14 years old and you're having a little fistfight," Lamar Odom said. "You get hit in the mouth too hard and you realize, 'Whoa.' We got beat, you know? They beat our (rear ends)."

Once again, the franchise that does it better than most, did failure spectacularly, buried by a hailstorm of Dallas daggers, by a hungrier, more energized opponent and by 20,000 Texas voices mocking them with a twang.

Facing the stunning end of their season and their reign as NBA champions, the Lakers managed to keep it a game for almost 18 whole minutes.

Then what happened? Jason Terry happened. The Dallas reserve started making 3-pointers and didn't stop until he had made the Lakers his own.

Humiliated, that's what they were and in the final game of Phil Jackson's Hall of Fame, 11-title coaching career.

But, no, it was even worse than that. Unable to find the courage to meet the Mavericks' challenge, Lakers' center Andrew Bynum decided to take the exit of a coward.

The 7-footer picked on Dallas' smallest player, 6-foot J.J. Barea, a player Ron Artest belittled (literally) Saturday saying he was only "5-2." As Barea was in the air going to the basket, Bynum drove his forearm into his defenseless target.

The fourth-quarter incident resulted in Bynum's ejection. A better penalty would have been forcing him to walk home."