Corey Brewer (13) of the Denver Nuggets drives with the ball against Kobe Bryant (24) of the Los Angeles Lakers, as Kosta Koufos (41) of the Denver Nuggets and Pau Gasol (16) of the Los Angeles Lakers look on at the Pepsi Center in Denver, Colorado, yesterday. The Nuggets defeated the Lakers 126-114.
DENVER, Colorado: Corey Brewer came off the bench and drained six three-pointers yesterday as the Denver Nuggets defeated Los Angeles 126-114 and snapped the Lakers’ NBA winning streak at five games.
Brewer led the Nuggets with 27 points. Kenneth Faried added 21 points and 15 rebounds and Ty Lawson chipped in 17 points and 14 assists for the Nuggets, who bounced back from a 112-100 Christmas Day loss to the Los Angeles Clippers.
To do so, the Nuggets had to overcome 40 points from Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant.
Pau Gasol added 19 points for the Lakers -- who were coming off a 100-94 victory over the New York Knicks in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
Dwight Howard scored 12 points and grabbed seven rebounds for the Lakers before he was ejected in the third quarter when he was whistled for a flagrant foul after making contact with the head of a driving Faried.
Howard clearly felt the ejection was an over-reaction.
“It was a hard foul, that’s all I know,” Howard said. “I’ve been fouled harder than that before and nobody ever got kicked out of the game for it, but I get penalized for fouling people hard.”
Leading by just one point early in the second half, Denver used a 14-2 scoring run to establish a double-digit lead.
Faried’s three-point play sparked the surge, and Danilo Gallinari capped it with a three-pointer that made it 73-60 with 7:51 remaining in the third quarter.
Gallinari finished the game with 19 points and Andre Iguodala added 17 points, 11 rebounds, seven assists and three steals for Denver.
The Lakers answered with a 12-5 run to trim the deficit to six points, but Howard’s ejection inspired Denver to a 6-0 spurt.
The Lakers pulled within four points late in the third, but Denver scored the final five points of the period -- including Brewer’s three-pointer as the quarter ended -- to take a 96-87 lead into the fourth.
Brewer drained another three-pointer early in the fourth to stretch Denver’s lead to 14 points, and the Lakers didn’t get closer than seven the rest of the way as Denver posted their seventh straight win at home.
Lakers coach Mike D’Antoni was reluctant to call the defeat a setback for a team that had point guard Steve Nash back for just the third game since he missed 24 contests with a broken leg.
But Gasol, who was sidelined himself for several games with tendinitis in his knees, admitted the loss was “a little bit of a setback” for a Lakers team that had appeared to be rounding into form after the slow start to the season that lead to the departure of former coach Mike Brown.
“We’ve got to think about the next one, which is Portland on Friday, and go from there,” Gasol said. “We have to analyze our losses and understand why it happened so we can prevent it from happening again.”
Meanwhile, the San Antonio Spurs took advantage of Toronto’s injury woes to snap the Raptors’ five-game winning streak with a 100-80 home victory.
San Antonio used a balanced attack, with all 12 of their players registering points, to systematically break down the visiting Raptors and ended Toronto’s longest winning run of the season.
Tim Duncan led the way with 15 points, Manu Ginobili added 14 off the bench and the Spurs (22-8) stretched their Southwest Division lead to two games over Memphis.
None of Toronto’s (9-20) five starters reached double-figures, although reserves Amir Johnson and Alan Anderson each finished with 12 points to pace the Raptors.
DeMar DeRozan had enjoyed strong performances against San Antonio in the past but only managed eight points in the latest encounter.
“You never know. Maybe he just had one of those nights where he wasn’t feeling it, but it’s better than the 25 he usually scores on us,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich told reporters. “We’re thrilled with that.”
The Raptors had managed to string together a succession of victories prior to yesterday’s game despite missing center Jonas Valanciunas, who broke his finger last week, guard Kyle Lowry and forward Andrea Bargnani through injury.
Toronto managed to stay pretty close to the Spurs until the latter stages of the third quarter, where San Antonio broke free with a 13-2 run that put them 70-55 ahead.
“We just came out more aggressive (in the second half) and realised we didn’t play well in the first half,” Ginobili said. “We were a little flat and we needed to pick it up.”
The victory was the second straight blowout for the Spurs, who routed Dallas 129-91 on Sunday.
This time, San Antonio barely had to exert themselves as they utilised the complete roster, and while Tony Parker registered 13 points and seven assists, it was the 45 points from the bench that made the difference.
Elsewhere, Josh Smith scored 31 points and Al Horford added 22 yesterday as the Atlanta Hawks held on for a 126-119 double-overtime NBA victory over the Detroit Pistons. AGENCIES
