The love for George Karl poured from the stands, just as it always did.
Many fans hadn’t had an opportunity to say goodbye to Karl, or even good luck. But before Sunday’s game at the Pepsi Center, the crowd found a way to say it missed the man and was happy to see him again, showering him with affection.
“This situation has a lot emotion, a lot of love, a lot of connection,” Karl said before coaching the Sacramento Kings in their 122-111 loss to the Nuggets, his former team. “A lot of wins in this building. A lot of fantastic games.”
The Nuggets are a very different team now.
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“I can’t deny, the first year, it didn’t feel good watching them play poorly,” Karl said. “Sometimes you may be rooting for them to play poorly, and then others times, ‘Why are they playing so poorly?’ Caught in the quandary of … how it disintegrated so fast, I think was actually painful to me.”
Asked whether the sting from being fired after a 57-win season endured, Karl hedged.
“I don’t know if I had hard feelings,” he said. “I had disappointment. I didn’t understand (being fired). But I have too many good memories here. I remember the day of the firing, the laughter and fun I had with my guys. So I don’t know if there are hard feelings. I wanted to end my life here. I wanted to end my career here. They took that away from me. But they gave me nine years, paid me well, had great teams.”
Karl fretted about stopping some of the players he used to coach, and he was right. For the Nuggets (30-50), it was a fun finish to what has at times been a frightening season at home.
The Nuggets have had only seven losing home seasons, and this is one of them.
But the 18-23 home record ranks fifth-worst out of the seven. The switch to interim coach Melvin Hunt, who pushed the pace back up to how the Nuggets used to play, and a more energized and engaged roster, resulted in a 7-4 home record down the stretch — after the team went 11-19 at the Pepsi Center under previous coach Brian Shaw.
It was important to the Nuggets to finish the season strong in front of the fans who had seen so many struggles at the Pepsi Center.
“They keep us going,” Hunt said. “That’s why it hurt during the year when we were getting booed. I’ll never forget the 84-point half against Portland. I’m not an emotional guy, but I was an inch from tears myself. It hurt. And hearing those boos hurt. But I know that they were hurting.
“But fast forward to today’s game. The effort our guys have been able to put out there, what a turnaround.”
Kenneth Faried scored a season-high 30 points, made 12-of-14 shots and grabbed seven rebounds. He said it was bittersweet playing against Karl, the coach who drafted him.
“I knew I had to do a job today,” Faried said. “But it was also good to see my former head coach.”
Christopher Dempsey: cdempsey@denverpost.com or
DENVER AT L.A. CLIPPERS 8:30 p.m. Monday, ALT; 950 AM
Spotlight on Jamal Crawford: The 6-foot-5 guard from Michigan missed a month because of a calf injury, but he’s starting to pick up where he left off as one of the NBA’s premier backups. He scored 11 points in 20 minutes off the bench in the Clippers’ win over Memphis on Saturday, and has averaged 21.5 points in two games against the Nuggets this season.
