Nuggets 110, Bobcats 88
DENVER -- Kosta Koufas scored a season-high 16 points, Andre Iguodala added 15 and the Denver Nuggets beat the Charlotte Bobcats 110-88 on Saturday to extend the Bobcats' losing streak to 15 games, a period of nearly one month.
Ramon Sessions scored 23 and Byron Mullens had 16 points and 14 rebounds for Charlotte, which hasn't won since Nov. 24 at Washington.
The Bobcats' losing streak is far short of the league record of 26 set by Cleveland two seasons ago. In fact, this isn't the longest losing streak in franchise history. Last year's team lost 21 straight in a season shortened to 66 games.
With games against Miami and Brooklyn coming up, the Bobcats' woes could continue for a few more games.
Denver ended its outside shooting woes against Charlotte. The Nuggets set an NBA single-game record by missing all 22 of their 3-point shots in Thursday's loss to Portland, and they looked headed for more futility Saturday. They missed their first six long-range shots before Jordan Hamilton connected with 8:02 left in the first half.
Denver made 6 of 14 3-pointers to finish the game.
The first 3-pointer seemed to relax the Denver players. Danilo Gallinari and Iguodala hit consecutive threes and Gallinari hit one with 1.3 seconds left in the second quarter as the Nuggets pulled away for a 64-46 halftime lead.
Denver built on it in the third quarter, going on a 12-5 run in the first 4:14 of the period to take a 76-51 lead, its biggest of the game to that point.
By the fourth quarter Denver coach George Karl had emptied his bench but the Bobcats didn't fare much better against them, falling behind by as many as 26.
The Nuggets played the second half without starting point guard Ty Lawson, who suffered a strained left Achilles in the first half.
NOTES: The Nuggets missed all five of their 3-point attempts in the first quarter Saturday. ... The Bobcats played without guards Ben Gordon and Gerald Henderson. Gordon missed his second straight game with right knee soreness and Henderson was sidelined after suffering a contusion on his right shin Friday. ... Mike Dunlap faced his former boss for the first time since taking over as Charlotte's coach. Dunlap served as an assistant on George Karl's staff from 2006-08 and Karl gave Bobcats' GM Rod Higgins a recommendation when Dunlap was interviewing. Dunlap was happy to be back in Denver. "It's home, so I like that a lot," he said. ... Karl didn't harp on his players after Thursday's rough shooting night in Portland when the Nuggets missed all 22 of their 3-point attempts, an NBA record, and had just two of its 93 points outside the paint or the foul line. "Didn't even talk about it," he said. "My whole emphasis was defense. We were good defensively but we could have been better. And the mistakes that we made, we could have won that game. The shots we took basically were good."
