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The Denver Nuggets had some negatives going against them as they entered Friday night’s game against the Indiana Pacers at the Pepsi Center. They had lost two straight road games to the Lakers and Suns; but to be fair, they did thrash Oklahoma City on Wednesday. But they also had some injuries to deal with as they would play Friday night without Kenyon Martin and Ty Lawson. How would the Nuggets deal with this adversity?

Very well, as it turned out, as they had Camrelo Anthony on the scene.

Anthony scored 34 points while getting ample support from Chauncey Billups and J.R. Smith as Denver managed to get past Indiana 122-114, sending the Pacers to their fifth consecutive road loss.

Smith drained a pair of 3-pointers in the last 90 seconds of the first quarter, helping the Nuggets take a 30-28 lead; the Nuggets looked to be on the verge of making this game a rout when it scored 12 of the next 17 points, moving in front 50-33 halfway through the second quarter on back-to-back dunks by Nene Hilario. But Indiana put together a 10-0 spurt to pull to within 52-45 and trailed 64-56 at the intermission after Danny Granger and Dahntay Jones  each made a pair of free throws in the final 47 seconds of the half.

The Pacers would pull to within 82-76 on a Josh McRoberts dunk with 4:03 left in the third quarter; the Nuggets would close the period with a 15-6 explosion, with Chris Andersen muscling in a putback and Anthony scoring 7 points during the surge. Denver would maintain a double-digit lead until the closing moments of the game.

Anthony led all Nuggets scorers with 34 points, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and a block while J.R. Smith added 20 (including three treys) with 4 rebounds, 8 assists and a steal; Andersen notched a double-double, scoring 13 with 10 rebounds, a steal and 3 blocks.

The Pacers’ high scorer was Granger  with 32 points (including 4 three-pointers), 4 rebounds, an assist, 2 steals and 2 blocks while Troy Murphy added 14 with 9 rebounds and 3 assists.

Denver (41-21) plays again on Sunday when they host the Portland Trail Blazers while Indiana (20-42) travels to Phoenix to take on the Suns Saturday night.