Turnovers down the stretch kill comeback in loss to New Orleans
The Washington Wizards’ search for an identity in the absence of Gilbert Arenas isn’t quite complete. Playing without him for the third time since his indefinite suspension, the Wizards rallied from a sizeable deficit but couldn’t overcome mistakes on the back end of each half in a 115-110 loss New Orleans in front of 14,753 at Verizon Center.
“There’s no one out there that can just consistently say, give me the ball, I’m going to go ahead and get you 30,” said center Brendan Haywood. “That’s not going to happen. We’re going to have to play better as a team, and I think we had some lulls, in the second quarter and in the fourth.”
Actually, Antawn Jamison led all scorers with 32 points, but Haywood was correct in that the Wizards (12-23) were undone by eight turnovers in the second period and three miscues on four possessions with less than three minutes to play.
Nick Young had 20 points off the bench — most of which came when Mike Miller was lost with a recurrence of a lingering right calf injury. But after his consecutive baskets reduced a four-point deficit down to a 101-101 tie with 3 minutes, 5 seconds left, Young made two errant passes and could only hang his head as the Hornets (19-16) pulled away for their sixth straight victory.
Chris Paul paced New Orleans with 26 points and 14 assists and was buoyed by Peja Stojakovic (20 points), Marcus Thornton (15 points) and James Posey (11 points), who were a combined 9 for 12 from behind the arc.
“We didn’t do a good job of staying connected to those guys,” said Wizards head coach Flip Saunders.
Paul also had two 3-pointers. The first, just before the halftime buzzer, gave the visitors a 60-49 lead. The second came in response to an 11-0 third-quarter Wizards run that tied the game, 76-76.
“You can’t make twos and give up threes,” said Wizards guard Randy Foye, who had 10 of his 23 points in the third quarter. “We did everything we could do everywhere else except for on the three-point line.”
Miller, whose availability was a game-time decision, left for the locker room just over two minutes into the third quarter and said he’ll get an MRI on Monday.
“It’s like playing with a spasm in your calf the whole time, and I think that’s from a lot of minutes the other night,” said Miller. “I maybe came back a little early, who knows. I’m just frustrated.”
