Sonics make a run for it late, but fall to Hornets

NEW ORLEANS -- If Sunday's game were a video game, Earl Watson would have immediately pressed reset.

Down one point with six seconds remaining in the game, Sonics forward Nick Collison rebounded the second of two missed free throws by New Orleans' Jannero Pargo, with the intent of passing to Watson. But with defender David West shading the Sonics guard, Collison hurried a pass ahead to Kevin Durant. The Sonics rookie, falling out of bounds, tried to ping the ball off Hornets guard Chris Paul's leg to keep possession, but instead caused a turnover.

Watson slammed both fists against his forehead. Collison dropped his head. Durant gave a disgusted look.

Out of timeouts, the Sonics watched Paul later make two free throws to seal the 91-88 win. He led all scorers with 29 points and had 10 assists, improving the Hornets to 14-7 before 10,773 at New Orleans Arena.

"I felt like I was in a hurry, so I took off dribbling and the first green I saw, I threw it," Collison said. "It was a terrible pass. I should have just kept dribbling until I found somebody, but that's what was going through my head. I just made a bad decision."

Watson said he sensed Collison may have been uncomfortable.

But it didn't lessen the sting of the loss.

"It's going to be a learning process, but at the same time, we can't accept these types of defeats," said Watson, whose team has lost eight games by seven points or less. "It was a tough play for Nick. You can't blame him, you've got to learn from experience so next time he'll be more equipped in that situation."

Sonics coach P.J. Carlesimo nearly refused to give any credit to the Sonics' second-half play, however. He spewed about the opening half and how the game was lost there.

Seattle was cold offensively, missing eight of its opening nine shots, and gave up 10 turnovers for 12 points in the opening half. That allowed a solid Hornets team to breeze to a 52-41 first-half lead on 53.5 percent shooting from the field.

"We were terrible," Carlesimo said. "Our defense was a disgrace. They open the game with a dunk, [our] guy doesn't even help [on defensive coverage]. We ran the wrong plays. I just don't know where we were. Our heads were not in the game. We weren't ready to play."

The Sonics (5-16) flipped the switch in the second half, using a 12-2 run -- and the best defense Carlesimo admitted to seeing -- to scrap their way back into the game.

Seattle trailed just 67-65 heading into the final period. But just as the Sonics were getting solid play from inside players Thomas, Collison and Chris Wilcox, Thomas suffered a cut upper lip and missed the final 6:32.

"I can't be mad at anyone but myself," Thomas said. "I reached in there and I should have just contained [on defense]. I'm upset I couldn't be out there to help my team, but they kept fighting."

Carlesimo said the loss of Thomas hurt the rotation inside.

"Nick and Weezy [Wilcox] play very well, but we probably ended up stretching minutes more than we would have," Carlesimo said. "The other way we could have made use if we had a fresher guy on the floor and Kurt happened to be giving us all three things -- the defense, the rebounding and he was making shots. So, yeah, you would have loved to have Kurt in at the end."

Or a reset button.

"I'm a sore loser," said Watson, who had another good outing with 12 points and eight assists. "I'm the kid that threw my Nintendo controller against the wall and broke it if I lost a game. People get bad raps for being sore losers, and I'm just one of them."

Jayda Evans: 206-464-2067 or jevans@seattletimes.com