NEW ORLEANS — Now the Nuggets get to find out what this team is made of.
The fun, festive feeling following two home blowouts of the Hornets faded into a sea of yellow confetti, streaming down on the winners and their fans at New Orleans Arena on Saturday afternoon. For the first time in this playoff series, the Nuggets are faced with adversity, though they still lead the series 2-1.
For the first time they have to answer the “what went wrong” questions and consider what adjustments they will need to make.
If there’s any worry among the players, it wasn’t apparent after the game. They were frustrated by the loss, but remain confident about the series.
“We’ve been fighting against adversity all season long,” forward Carmelo Anthony said. “Winning this series, the series doesn’t start until you win on somebody else’s home court. We have a chance to do that here on Monday.”
Losing isn’t something the Nuggets have experienced often in the past 45 days. Saturday’s defeat was just their fourth loss in their past 19 games, only their third loss in April.
“We still have the momentum. Our confidence ain’t going nowhere,” Anthony said. “The Hornets did a great job of winning this game on their home court. We just got to go back, watch some film and practice on the things we didn’t do right,and go back to doing the things we were doing in the first two games.”
None of the Nuggets believes the team needs to make major fixes. Anthony pointed to the hustle categories, such as offensive rebounding and getting after loose balls, which the Nuggets did well Saturday.
“We’re fine,” guard Chauncey Billups said. “We’re up 2-1 and have an opportunity to try and steal one here on Monday night. We’re going to put everything we have into trying to do that.”
Coach George Karl has praised his team all season as being one that doesn’t let failure linger. The Nuggets have shown the ability to forget about tough losses. Forward Kenyon Martin said there’s no reason to think the Nuggets won’t do that again Monday night.
“I don’t expect anything less from this team but to come out and compete better than we did today,” Martin said. “We just (have to) come out, put everything on the line.”
The Nuggets haven’t lost consecutive games in more than a month, since a three-game skid March 6-9. Since then, the Nuggets have been nearly untouchable.
But, they failed to keep Hornets guard Chris Paul under wraps Saturday. Paul scored 32 points, had 12 assists and made 11-of-20 shots. Whenever New Orleans needed a big play, he seemed to make it.
“We just have to see what the coaching staff says and go from there,” said Nuggets guard Anthony Carter, who matched up with Paul at times. “It’s just going to be about X’s and O’s next game, I think.
“It’s just going to be a challenge for us. We’re still in a great place. We got another game on Monday, and we just got to see where we go from there. But I thought we did a lot of good things. It’s going to be a good challenge to see where we stand the next game.”
Chris Dempsey: 303-954-1279 or cdempsey@denverpost.com
