With his trial looming, Kobe Bryant figures to be fair game for hecklers and sign-wavers when the Los Angeles Lakers go on the road this season.

"It will probably be different, but it will bring us closer together," teammate Shaquille O'Neal said Monday. "We know we want to get off to a good, great start, so none of that stuff is really going to affect most of our guys. We just have to be ready for it. We know it's coming.

"I'm not worried at all. As long as none of them [opponents' fans] try to be 'Billy Bad' and step across the line, I don't have a problem with it."

A couple of hours after the Lakers finished practice Monday, Judge Frederick Gannett ruled in Eagle, Colo., that Bryant must stand trial on a charge of sexually assaulting a 19-year-old resort worker. Bryant has claimed the sex was consensual.

His next appearance in court is scheduled for Nov. 10.

The Lakers' season opener is Oct. 28, at home against Dallas. Their first road game is Nov. 1, at Phoenix.

After practice, Bryant said he can deal with any negative reactions.

Coming back from offseason knee surgery that he underwent in Colorado the morning after the alleged assault, Bryant joined O'Neal and new teammates Karl Malone and Gary Payton in drills on Monday, the first time the four superstars have practiced together at full speed.

Bryant said he was pleased to be able to concentrate on basketball for a while.

"When you're playing a game, you don't think about anything else but the game. You come to work, you do your job, and I love my job," he said. "I'm very thankful for that."

Malone said, "We're excited to have him back in his element and support him."

He agreed with O'Neal that tough crowds in other cities would make the Lakers closer.

"As we go out on the road in hostile territory, we've got to pull together. But by going through adversity right now, I think it will just make us stronger as a team. I think by the time June rolls around, we will have been there, done that, and we can get on with business," said Malone, who like Payton took a pay cut to join the Lakers to have a better shot at his first NBA championship.

Coach Phil Jackson expects a circus-like atmosphere when the Lakers play in other arenas.

"We anticipate that every road game is going to be a collection of news and media kinds of things that put a lot of energy into the games," Jackson said. "There's an added emphasis. They want to see how we play together as a group of guys and they also want to see how Kobe's going to be affected and how well he stands up underneath that.

"He's faced all kinds of situations. I can't imagine anything more hostile than Kobe having to go to his hometown of Philadelphia in the playoffs two years ago and have them soundly jeer and boo him. And yet he did an outstanding job in those playoffs. He's stood up to all kinds of pressure, but he's had to in the course of his career. This is different, of course."

Bryant plans to make his first exhibition appearance of the year Thursday, when the Lakers play the Los Angeles Clippers in Anaheim.

"He's a competitor. He's mentally strong, so I think he's going to be fine," Payton said.