HOUSTON — The scene finally calm around the Nuggets, the only ruckus Thursday night was from a Houston Rockets crowd that loudly, and joyously, celebrated the reunion of its back-to-back title teams in the 1990s.
And then celebrated their current team, led by James Harden.
Harden was hot early and never cooled off, scoring 38 points in three quarters before attempting to sit out the fourth quarter with his team comfortably in the lead. But they needed his services in the fourth, and he ran his point total to a career-high 50 as the Rockets put away the Nuggets 118-108 at the Toyota Center.
“Think about it, a guy scores 50 points and they beat us by 10,” Nuggets interim coach Melvin Hunt said. “We played. It just took us too long to jump into the game. A guy that good, he’s going to apply pressure to you, so you have to apply pressure to him. It took us too long to jump in the game, and he’s too good to wait.”
Harden deflected attention.
“Give credit to my teammates,” said Harden, who was 12-of-27 from the field and hit 22 free throws — 11 more than the Nuggets made as a team. “(They) did a great job of finding me, and Coach did a great job of putting me in the position to be successful.”
It was the second consecutive loss on this road trip for the Nuggets, who are cooling off a bit after a sizzling start under Hunt. The Nuggets had already clinched a second consecutive season with a losing record.
For the first time on the trip, all of the players were in uniform and available to play, which they did.
The Nuggets weren’t able to get a defensive foothold. Their defense was titled to try to slow down Harden, but the MVP candidate slashed into the lane anyway, collapsing the Nuggets’ defense. From there, the Rockets whipped passes around until someone had an open look. The Nuggets’ defense was strung out and chasing for most of the game.
“They came out and swung first,” Nuggets guard Randy Foye said. “And they’re extremely comfortable on their home court. They play well here. They tend to run faster here. They shoot more 3s. They do everything better here.”
Offensively, the Nuggets had a hard time getting Ty Lawson going. The point guard was 5-of-12 from the field to finish with 12 points and had six turnovers, though he did add 10 assists. But without his scoring and the Nuggets not truly clamping down on defense until the fourth quarter, it was too much to overcome.
Wilson Chandler and Foye led Denver with 23 points apiece. Foye kept the Nuggets in contact from the 3-point line, hitting five on the night, part of the Nuggets’ 13 from beyond the arc.
Christopher Dempsey: cdempsey@denverpost.com or
