Kobe Bryant didn’t score, the Phoenix Suns couldn’t run.

Nothing was quite as it was supposed to be Sunday when the Suns escaped with a 107-102 victory over Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers.

“We certainly didn’t play very well,” said Suns point guard Steve Nash. “We look at that as a positive. We didn’t play well and we found a way to win, and we’ve got a lot of improvement to make.”

Tim Thomas had 22 points and a career playoff-high 15 rebounds for the Suns, who nearly succumbed to coach Phil Jackson’s game plan of taking the small Phoenix lineup inside, then turning to Bryant to finish it off.

Thomas was sent home by the Chicago Bulls for what they thought was a bad attitude for most of this season, then released and signed by Phoenix on March 3. He made his first eight shots and finished 8-for-10, 4-for-5 from 3-point range.

“I was just aggressive on both ends,” Thomas said.

Nash had 20 points, including a crucial 3-pointer with 1:07 to play, and 10 assists.

The Suns made 32 of 35 free throws, 8 for 8 by Nash.

“The Phoenix Suns set a record for fewest free throws in the league,” Jackson said, “and here they have 35 free throws. This is a team we told our guys not to foul, and we end up sending them to the line 35 times. That was one of the things we didn’t expect to happen.”

Shawn Marion added 19 points, Boris Diaw 15 and Leandro Barbosa 15, nine in the fourth quarter.

Bryant, the NBA scoring champion with 35.4 points per game, scored 22 points — little more than half the 42.5 he averaged against Phoenix in the regular season — on 7-for-21 shooting, 1 for 6 3s. But Lamar Odom had 21 points and 14 rebounds and Luke Walton matched his career best in any NBA game with 19 points.

“Our game plan was to exploit the middle and do the things we wanted to, but he (Bryant) was still supposed to be a force over on that side of the offense,” Jackson said. “I just felt he never really got in rhythm until the end, and we said ‘Just go after it.”’

Even for Bryant, Jackson said, it’s tough to turn it on after spending most of the game working the ball to others.

“He was a little more passive than usual,” Suns coach Mike D’Antoni said. “He missed some shots that he normally makes.”

But Bryant said he felt good about the series.

“It’s just a matter of finding that groove,” Bryant said. “We can really attack this team inside, and so that’s what we’re going to do. All I need is one jumper to go, and I’m hot.”

After a 39-point first quarter, the Suns rarely got their trademark high-speed game in gear.

Trailing by as many as 14 in the second quarter and down 58-50 at the break, the Lakers used an uncharacteristically balanced attack and took advantage of the Suns’ poor shooting to tie it at 75 after three quarters.

Sasha Vujacic’s 3-pointer from the top of the key gave the Lakers their first lead since early in the first quarter, 80-79, with 10:01 to play. Thomas returned to the game and sank the Suns’ first 3-pointer since the opening quarter to put Phoenix back ahead 82-80 9:25 from the finish.

Bryant missed four shots over the next 2½ minutes and the Suns used free throws — two by Nash and four by Barbosa — to go up 88-82 with 6:21 left.

The Lakers scored six in a row to cut it to 98-95 with 2:12 remaining. Smush Parker, who had 15 points, missed what would have been a game-tying 3-pointer. Raja Bell missed a running 14-footer, but Diaw tipped the rebound to Nash, whose 3-pointer put Phoenix ahead 101-95 with 1:07 left.

Nash took the shot with his coach screaming to bring the ball outside to run out more clock.

“I didn’t hear him. I wasn’t going to listen to him anyways,” Nash said. “We really kind of just struggled through the game, so when I saw that ball coming off to Boris I knew I was going to get a great look. I wasn’t going to pass it up and pull it out and see what we got later. I was going to make it, and that’s all there is to it.”

Notes: Jackson lost Game 1 of the playoffs for the first time in his career. ... Vujacic made a bank shot from beyond midcourt at the first-quarter buzzer, but it was waved off by officials and replays confirmed the call. ... The Lakers were without Chris Mihm because of a sprained right ankle that sidelined him 17 of the last 18 regular-season games. ... The Suns’ Brian Grant had a bad stomach and played the final three seconds of the first half only.

The Toronto Raptors are keeping guard Andre Barrett for the rest of this season and beyond.

Barrett, 24, reached terms Tuesday with Toronto on a contract for the 2006-07 campaign.

Financial details were not disclosed.

Toronto signed Barrett to consecutive 10-day contracts following his March 14 release from the Phoenix Suns.

Barrett has been solid in a reserve role for the Raptors, averaging 4.7 points, 2.8 assists, 1.3 rebounds and 15.7 minutes in nine appearances off the bench.

He posted nine points and two assists in 21 minutes with Phoenix.

Barrett split last season between the Houston Rockets and Orlando Magic, averaging 3.1 points, 1.8 assists, 1.0 rebounds and 12.7 minutes in 39 games, including one start.

It seems Phoenix Suns point guard and defending MVP, Steve Nash, is up to his old tricks again. This season he goes beyond behind-the-back passes and zany dribbling reminiscent of oldie Bob Cousy.

Nash and the Suns have followed their 2004-05 season with another dominating, high-octane performance. The Suns have repeated their exciting brand of play without the assistance of former Rookie of the Year and leading scorer Amare Stoudemire. With Stoudemire on the injured reserve for all but three games this season, no one believed Phoenix would be atop the Pacific division with just a few weeks remaining before the playoffs.

Stoudemire led the Suns in scoring last season, averaging 26 points in addition to hauling in nine rebounds per game. After losing to the Spurs last season in the Western Conference Finals, management began to look at solid defensive performers to supplant the league’s top scoring team.

The likes of Kurt Thomas and Raja Bell were brought in to show some toughness to this year’s attack, hoping Phoenix could fall back on its defense in case their legs got weak come playoff time.

While the Suns have improved their swiss cheese defense from last year, they still relish on Head Coach Mike D’Antoni’s blistering offensive schemes and Italian-infused offense. The Suns again lead the NBA in points per game, scoring close to 108 per outing – all this with Stoudemire on injured reserve and Joe Johnson and Quentin Richardson departed to free agency.

The success of the Suns relies even heavier on Nash’s No. 13 jersey. Nash again leads the league in assists with 10.5 per game – the only player in the double-digits. With Stoudemire’s absence (due to a microfracture in his left knee) and Thomas filling in as center this season, Nash has gone from averaging 15 points per game last season to just less than 20 this season.

In addition to defenses focusing less attention to Phoenix’s front court sans Stoudemire, opposing guards have less to worry about now that Johnson and Richardson are gone. That is exactly why Nash should have a more difficult time this season. Instead, he’s taken his game up another notch, playing on a level very few players in the league are able to play.

If Nash were to win this year’s MVP award, he’d become just the ninth player in NBA history to win the award in back-to-back seasons and just the 11th player to win the award multiple times in his career.

Not too bad for the 10-year veteran who played his college ball for Santa Clara and was released by the Dallas Mavericks in 2004 for fear that his body may have begun its downward progression toward injuries.

Sure, Nash isn’t the electrifying scorer that Kobe Bryant has become. He hits more than 90 percent of his free throws, but he’ll never come close to sinking 81 points in a single game. His layups are far-less exciting than a LeBron James or Dwayne Wade windmill. And critics could argue he has more talent around him than Minnesota’s Kevin Garnett and L.A.’s Elton Brand – with fellow All-Star Shawn Marion doing much of the dirty work alongside the 195-pound point guard.

But put Bell, Eddie House and Boris Diaw on any other team, and try telling me they’d be having breakout seasons like they’re all having this year – and all because who plays point in Phoenix. Trust me, their “thank you” cards are already in the mail. Bell is averaging a career-best 15 points per game and has made nearly three times as many 3’s (166) than his previous year’s best (62 in 03-04). House leads the NBA in number of 3-pointers made per 48 minutes. Diaw, who is the front-runner to win the league’s Most Improved Player award, has created a name for himself playing alongside Nash and is now considered to be one of the NBA’s most versatile players.

Diaw joins Jason Kidd, James, Wade and Andrei Kirilenko as the only players this season to record multiple triple-doubles this season.

And there are still some out there that think with all the roster changes Phoenix has been forced to make, losing the team’s leading scorer and one of the league’s best big men to injury, and leading the Pacific division (who will likely have four teams in the playoffs), that Nash is somehow undeserving of this award?

Yeah, I guess that’d be like saying Oscar Robertson was “overrated” and Magic “was only good because he played with Kareem.”

With all the turmoil Phoenix has had to face this season and still coming out of the fire alive, I’d say there’s no other player more deserving of this award than Steve Nash. His hair is pretty cool, too.