David West began the first-round playoff series against the Nuggets with Kenyon Martin firmly attached to his hip.
West never could completely shake him off Sunday night.
The result was a wasteland performance, full of missed shots, a few turnovers and general frustration.
West is an all-star. Stars shine best when the lights are the brightest. At least, that’s supposed to be the case.
West, however, couldn’t find the range, scoring 12 points and hitting just 4-of-16 shots from the field in the Hornets’ blowout loss in Game 1 at the Pepsi Center. Just four points came in the second half, and none of those were in the fourth quarter.
“Kenyon’s ‘D’ on West, you can’t do it better,” Nuggets coach George Karl said. “We had a very good defensive game.”
West entered Sunday as the Hornets’ second-leading scorer at 21 points per game. He also averaged 8.6 rebounds. The Nuggets held him under both averages.
It had been a full month since West was held to 12 or fewer points. He had scored in the teens just twice in the entire month of April.
“I just thought Kenyon did a real good job,” Hornets coach Byron Scott said. “I think the one thing we have to do with D-West is get him moving more. He’s just too stationary, and that’s easy for Kenyon to guard.”
West did not play in the fourth quarter.
“You’ve got to give Kenyon a lot of respect on that end,” Scott said. “He’s a very good defender. He’s strong, he’s quick. So if you don’t get him moving, if you just kind of stand around and try to pound it inside, he’s not going to give a whole lot of ground. We just got to do a better job of getting him to move a little bit more.”
New Orleans guard Chris Paul agreed. He didn’t shoot the ball particularly well, either, just 7-of-19, but said the duo needed to just make more shots.
“That’s just us maybe concentrating more and finding our touch,” Paul said.
Chris Dempsey: 303-954-1279 or cdempsey@denverpost.com
