Kenyon Martin scored underneath with 45 seconds left after Anthony Carter stole the ball from Tim Duncan and the Denver Nuggets turned away the San Antonio Spurs 80-77 Thursday night. Martin, who had missed four of five games since straining his right hamstring on Dec. 20, then rejected Tony Parker at the other end for his seventh block, and Allen Iverson sank two free throws with 6.6 seconds left to give the Nuggets a three-point lead. After a timeout, Michael Finley was off-target on a contested 3-pointer that would have tied it.

Iverson scored 29 points and Carmelo Anthony added 17 for the Nuggets.

Parker and Duncan scored 20 points for San Antonio and Finley added 18. Duncan missed 13 of 20 shots, but he did get hot in the fourth quarter.

The Spurs were without Manu Ginobili (finger) for the fourth straight game, and the Spurs missed his offense along with Duncan's usual shooting touch.

Duncan missed 14 of his first 18 shots but banked one in, sank a layup and made one underneath to give the Spurs a 75-73 lead with 2 1/2 minutes remaining.

Duncan jammed his right thumb when he was fouled by Martin midway through the third quarter. He shook it off and made one of two foul shots to pull San Antonio to 54-46, then hit a wide-open jumper with 2 minutes left in the third quarter to put the Spurs ahead 57-56.

Iverson's buzzer-beater put the Nuggets ahead 60-59 after three quarters, and the Spurs didn't hit their first field goal of the fourth quarter until Finley sank a contested jumper from the top of the key at the 7:43 mark, pulling the Spurs to 67-63.

The Spurs started out cold, missing 22 of their first 29 shots and falling behind 33-17 as Duncan was 1-for-6 from the floor and 0-for-3 from the free-throw line. But San Antonio battled back as the Nuggets went cold themselves, and the Spurs pulled to 42-40 at halftime.

It was just the type of game the Spurs wanted - but the Nuggets improved to 3-8 in games in which they score fewer than 100 points.

Duncan finished 6-for-10 from the free-throw line and had four turnovers as the Spurs fell to 25-14 in Denver since 1989-90.

Notes:@ Iverson didn't practice all week because of what the team said was a family matter. ... G DerMarr Johnson, who played the past three seasons in Denver, returned with the Spurs, whom he joined last week out of the NBA Developmental League because of injuries to Ginobili and Brent Barry (torn calf). Johnson finished with two points... Marcus Camby scored his 7,000th career point with a jumper in the opening minutes.