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Aminu helps Hornets put away Suns

Feb 7, 2013 - 4:22 AM New Orleans, LA (Sports Network) - Al-Farouq Aminu scored six of his 16 points during a game-sealing run late in the fourth quarter, helping the New Orleans Hornets snap a four-game slide with a 93-84 victory over the Phoenix Suns.

Aminu also pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds, and Greivis Vasquez recorded a double-double of his own with 19 points and 12 assists for the Hornets, who shot 52 percent from the field and allowed just 31 points in the second half.

"We just defended better in the second half," Hornets head coach Monty Williams said. "We did enough to get stops and scores when we needed it."

The Suns, coming off a win at Memphis on Tuesday, received 14 points apiece from Jared Dudley and Marcin Gortat.

A wildly back-and-forth first half featured 19 lead changes and 11 ties, but the upper hand switched just twice after the break as the Hornets took control with a 13-2 run midway through the third quarter.

Vasquez opened the stretch with a go-ahead layup and ended it with an alley- oop feed to Aminu for a 73-63 advantage with 3:45 remaining in the frame.

"I thought defensively they took us out of what we wanted to do," Dudley said. "We had a lot of unforced and forced turnovers that led to transition points."

A Gortat jumper pulled the Suns within 85-80 down the stretch, but an Eric Gordon 21-footer followed by six consecutive points from Aminu put the game away.

Phoenix led, 27-26, after the first quarter and trailed by one, 54-53, at halftime.

Game Notes

The Suns had won four straight meetings against the Hornets ... Gordon, who had missed two of the previous three games with a sore knee and balky back, scored nine points on 3-of-14 shooting ... Ryan Anderson scored 14 points for the Hornets, who had 16 fastbreak points to Phoenix's six ... Goran Dragic logged 13 points and six assists in defeat.