LOS ANGELES — Sooner or later, the Carmelo Anthony of old had to show up. Fortunately for the Nuggets, that was Wednesday night. They needed every last drop.
Anthony put an emphatic end to his scoring troubles, dropping 30 points in the Nuggets’ 106-105 win over the Los Angeles Clippers at the Staples Center. It was his first 30-point game this season, and first since April when he had 36 against the Clippers.
The Nuggets survived a last-second miss on a 3-pointer by former Nugget Marcus Camby to win.
“It was a scary feeling,” Anthony Carter said of Camby’s shot. “I thought he had a pretty good look. Fortunately he missed it.”
Perhaps the most impressive part was Anthony didn’t sacrifice the intangibles to get his offense rolling. He pulled down 11 rebounds and continued to stick a prominent nose in defensive matters. Nene added 17 points and nine rebounds, and Kenyon Martin finished with 17 points and 10 rebounds.
“I just tried to be aggressive tonight,” Anthony said. “We buckled down. We won.”
Anthony started hot, scoring 16 points in the first half on 5-of-9 shooting.
Overall, Anthony shot 8-of-21 from the field and 14-of-16 on free throws.
Anthony has maintained a cool head, despite struggling to score, and has been praised for consistently playing a solid all-around floor game. Wednesday, he married the two.
Before the game, Nuggets coach George Karl openly worried about playing the Clippers, citing a perfect storm of events that he reasoned usually spurs teams to play well. Los Angeles was playing for the first time with new acquisitions, forwards Zach Randolph and Mardy Collins; Camby was facing his old team for the first time in the regular season, and Clippers coach Mike Dunleavy missed the game because of personal reasons.
Still, none of that seemed to matter to the Nuggets (10-5), who won for the ninth time in 11 games.
The Clippers trailed 79-71 heading into the fourth quarter, but rallied and tied the game at 103 on rookie Eric Gordon’s 3-pointer with 1:34 remaining. Anthony’s basket at 1:15 put Denver ahead. Martin made 1-of-2 free throws to stretch the lead to 106-103 and the Nuggets held on.
Camby won’t write home about his first game against the Nuggets after missing the potential winning shot, but he was effective with 17 points and 11 rebounds. Gordon led the Clippers with 24 points.
Chris Dempsey: 303-954-1279 or cdempsey@denverpost.com
