Basketball coaches love the numbers game. They find formulas that suit them. Then they preach them.
Here is one of George Karl’s favorites: Road victories minus home losses give you a firm feel for your team.
Even if your overall record is under .500 but you are good in that formula, your team is OK, Karl says. If you are over .500 and your team is not good in that formula, you could be a mirage. A team headed toward collapse.
The Nuggets swatted the Cavaliers on Wednesday night at home with familiar faces and familiar digs providing the backdrop. Cleveland did its part, missing free throws at the end and 15 total for the night, plus a tip-in attempt as the buzzer sounded that bounced hard and long off the rim. It was a 90-89 game that looked repeatedly won and lost until the final second.
The Nuggets won it with defense. With Earl Boykins sinking a 3-pointer late. With Carmelo Anthony driving the baseline and nastily throwing it down late.
That avoided a Nuggets home loss. They already have eight.
The Nuggets have eight road victories.
The Karl differential? Zero.
Zero means the Nuggets have a chance to be good. Zero means the Nuggets have done just enough at home to be good. Zero means the Nuggets, despite their bushel of injuries, have had enough punch to earn as many victories on the road as they have absorbed losses at home.
We are spoiled.
We expect more. We expect more because the Nuggets last season under Karl were 19-1 at home and 31-10 at home overall. They won 18 road games overall.
The Pepsi Center is supposed to provide them with an enviable edge. This season, the Nuggets are 13-8 in the building.
It is not what the Nuggets want, not what we expect, and this near slip-up to the Cavaliers could have singed the Nuggets. They were 2-4 on their last homestand. They just won two of three on the road. To return home and lose to Cleveland minus Larry Hughes and Drew Gooden would have punctured the Nuggets. Especially after the way they made LeBron James look common (7-of-20 shots made, 24 points).
“This was our loudest home crowd of the year,” Karl said. “A good team will win 30 games at home. We are going to have trouble doing that, but we still have a chance. We still have a chance to be good in our road wins minus home losses. Until we get healthy, we are going to have some close games. No blowouts.”
Not as ferocious in rebounding or shot blocking or shot-making or in their breakneck, fast-paced style.
No Marcus Camby or Nene, the injuries up and down the roster have forced the Nuggets to be more modest in their approach if not in their hopes.
“I could feel the crowd tonight, the energy,” Nuggets forward Eduardo Najera said. “They were pretty loud, and I think it’s one of the reasons Cleveland missed so many free throws, especially at the end. The first month or so of the season, we did not play our game. We’ve had injuries, sure, but we also didn’t do things well as a team. Now we are starting to make up for some of that. We are starting to play good basketball.”
It is time.
The Nuggets are one game away from the halfway mark.
They get nowhere if they do not establish dominance once again at home. Oh, they will hang around, compete, possibly even make the playoffs.
But a dominant home team is a force.
A dominant home team can help boost confidence on the road. The more success a team has at home, the more it can apply that to the road.
It all starts at home.
The Nuggets play two of their next three games at home. They are two games over .500 for the season for the first time since Dec. 12.
“Basketball is a strange game,” Karl said. “You want to play perfect. You can’t. Team effort is always rewarded. We never had the pace I like. The penetration was not where I want it to be.”
Victory at home, though, is sweet for the elite level the Nuggets seek.
And essential. Without it, the season is a zero.
Staff writer Thomas George can be reached at 303-820-1994 or tgeorge@denverpost.com.
