What is going on?
The Nuggets, once the darlings of the Western Conference elite, have lost eight of their past 11 games after Monday night’s 97-95 loss to the Houston Rockets at the Pepsi Center.
The Nuggets were 23-7 at home entering Monday’s game. As for the recent losses, Nuggets coach George Karl said before the game, “It’s not raining. It’s just cloudy.”
Today should be pretty ominous in Denver.
The Rockets played without former all-star Tracy McGrady, sidelined by knee surgery. Then again, the Rockets (42-23) are 11-2 since McGrady called it a season.
Here’s the good news for the Nuggets: The schedule is pretty favorable for the next week or so, with games against the Thunder, Clippers and Nets.
Still, all of a sudden, Denver has some significant issues. For starters, the Nuggets aren’t consistently making shots. A lot of that is because Denver (40-25) no longer is passing the ball proficiently. The Nuggets ranked eighth in the NBA entering Monday with 21.7 assists per game, but in the past three games, all losses, Denver had totals of 11, 13 and 17. The hip injury of Anthony Carter (averaging 4.5 assists) has hurt, but teams don’t often win with sub-20 assists.
During the third quarter Monday, Chauncey Billups was near the top of the key just a few feet from Carmelo Anthony on the left wing. Billups looked to pass to Anthony, but there was miscommunication between the Denver stars. Ron Artest easily slipped in between, snatched the pass and slammed a breakaway dunk to a soundtrack of boos.
