From the Verizon Shooting Gallery

Well, at least something moves quickly in the District of Columbia: the Wizards and the Hornets rolled up a total of 120 points in 24 minutes. Unfortunately for the Bees, they had only 55 of them. Sixty more points were scored in the third, split 30-30, leaving Washington up 95-85. You might infer from this that there wasn't a whole lot of defense in evidence, and you would be correct — until the fourth quarter, when the Wizards went on a 20-4 tear and simply ran away with it. The final: 125-103.

And Washington did all this without Caron Butler; Andray Blatche started, and Antawn Jamison (21 points) helped take up the slack. Darius Songaila, off the bench, took six shots and made them all. And there was this fellow named Arenas who got 30 points and 11 assists. The Hornets shot a decent 49 percent, but the Wizards stayed around 60 percent for almost the entire game, and what's more, Washington dominated the boards, outrebounding the Bees 42-31.

Still, 103 points, even in a losing battle, suggests some serious offense. Chris Paul, ignoring that stress issue, rolled up 21 points; David West had 17; the bench was good for 44, led by the Jacksons (Bobby and Marc), with 10 each. And they missed only two free throws out of 22, though three-balls were hard to come by (5 of 19).

This is, if I remember correctly, the seventh time in a row that a Wizards-Hornets game was won by the home team. The Bees will be back at the Ford on Monday night to take on the Celtics; whatever Beantown's problems in recent years, they've not had much trouble thrashing the Hornets, so it would not be wise to take them lightly.

Posted at 8:24 PM to Net Proceeds