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Streaking Lakers sting Hornets

Jan 10, 2008 - 6:08 AM NEW ORLEANS (Ticker) -- Kobe Bryant scored 19 points and Andrew Bynum added 17 to lead the Los Angeles Lakers to a 109-80 victory over the New Orleans Hornets on Wednesday.

Bryant added seven rebounds and seven assists for the Lakers, who have won eight of their last nine games.

Los Angeles started the game on a 16-4 run and never looked back. It led 32-19 after the first and never trailed.

"We got off to a quick start. That is one of the things you want to do on the road, especially in this type of environment," Bryant said. "You try not to let the crowd get into it right off the bat."

Bryant was 8-of-16 from the field and led five Lakers in double figures. Los Angeles got contributions from a number of players, Lakers reserves outscored the Hornets' bench 42-9.

""My role now has changed," Bryant said. "I'm not the guy who has to go out and score 35-something points. They come to me and I get buckets when we need a little boost here and there, and that's as it should be."

The Hornets were hoping that some recent road success would carry over at home but that was not the case.

"We just didn't come out with an aggressive mindset," New Orleans coach Byron Scott said. "I thought the first quarter, we allowed them to just kind of play basketball, and anytime you allow them to just play and pass it where they want to, and get where they want to, they're going to kill you."

New Orleans, which has won six straight on the road, had its three-game win streak snapped despite the efforts of Chris Paul and David West.

Paul scored 32 points but had his double-double streak ended at four. West added 19 points and nine rebounds but they were the only two Hornets to show up.

New Orleans shot 37 percent (31-of-84) from the field, including 1-of-11 on 3-pointers. Starting guard Morris Peterson played 23 minutes and failed to score for the Hornets.

"We established something early in the game and were able to control the tempo," Lakers coach Phil Jackson said. "We made a conscious effort to stop Stojakovic and make Paul try and do everything and prevent him from having all of his outlets and except for a couple of times we did a pretty good job of that."

Luke Walton scored 14 points, Lamar Odom had 11 and Trevor Ariza added 10 off the bench for Los Angeles, which has won four straight, including both games of a brief two-game road trip by a combined 45 points.

"(Bryant) really didn't hurt us. I thought it was those other guys," West said. "Everybody who came in the game scored. We were worried about Kobe by trapping him and then one or two passes and Farmar is hitting shots and Walton is hitting shots. The guys off the bench gave them a spark. When we made a little run they came in and pushed the lead back up."