‘MILE HIGH’ NUGGETS BLOW OUT HORNETS TO LEAD SERIES 2-0

The Denver Nuggets continued to take advantage of their tough home court on Wednesday night, posting a 108-93 victory over the New Orleans Hornets to take a 2-0 lead in their best of seven opening round NBA playoff series.  It was the second straight blowout victory for Denver, who won Sunday’s game one by an even more lopsided 113-84 score.

After scoring 36 points in game one, Chauncey Billups again led the Nuggets with 31 points in Wednesday’s contest.  Carmello Anthony just missed a ‘double/double’ with 22 points and 9 assists, while reserve J.R. Smith chipped in for fifteen points.  Starters Kenyon Martin (13 points) and Dahntay Jones (11 points) completed Denver’s double digit scoring tally.  In his postgame comments, Nuggets coach George Karl talked at length about his leading scorer Billups:

"I do want to kind of apologize. I said he's a player 'without skills' after the series opener, He's very skilled. But he plays the game without skills a lot. He plays the game with a brain, and a teamness, a point guard leadership. Then he figures out when to put the skills in the game.  I'm happy he's putting a few more skills on the court lately. It's pretty cool."

Billups then tried to make sense of Karl’s someone convoluted observation on his play:

"I've always kind of been a safe player. I don't take that many chances if I don't have to. I try to make the right play. I don't always make the right play but I try to. I try to think the game out, but I'm in a nice little groove right now and guys have been playing great around me.

"And it's just been a lot of fun. Winning is fun, man."

David West’s ‘double/double’ consisting of 21 points and 10 rebounds paced the Hornets, while Peja Stojakovic added 17.  Chris Paul also earned ‘double/double’ status with his 14 point, 13 assist effort.  Rasual Butler and reserve James Posey each contributed 12 points to round out New Orleans’ double digit scorers.

Hornets’ leading scorer West emphasized his team’s need to defend Billups with greater intensity:

"We have to make life more difficult for him, make him play under a little more duress. He does too good a job of getting his team into what needs to be run. He won't allow them to take bad shots. He's controlling that team over there. He doesn't allow them to get out of sorts. He doesn't allow them to get out of control. He has them in control from start to finish.”

Nuggets’ coach Karl stressed that the two back-to-back blowouts will mean little as the series shifts to New Orleans for the next two games:

"They're going to be very angry and very physical. The game got a little more chippy tonight. It seemed like they were trying to tease us into mistakes and I'm sure it's going to continue on the road. Coach [Byron] Scott is obviously upset with the physicality of the game and we'll see where it goes."

Games three and four are slated for the New Orleans Arena on Saturday and Monday.  Game five, if necessary, will be back in Denver on Wednesday night.