Never been worse: Wolves break records in 152-114 loss at Phoenix

Now that's how you celebrate a gorilla's birthday.

The Suns' mascot celebrated Tuesday night with a big cake and, of course, by having all his mascot friends join him for the party.

And what a party it was.

For the home team, of course.

The Suns gave their starters practically half the night off and still handed the Wolves a defeat that goes in the record books, 152-114.

The 79 points the Wolves allowed before halftime was the most in franchise history, two more points than the 77 Denver scored against them in 1992 and Golden State scored against them in 1994.

Those, of course, were the Wolves teams of Lance Blanks, Brad Sellers, Gundars Vetra, Bob McCann, Marlon Maxey, Tellis Frank, Thurl Bailey, Stacey King, Mike Brown, Chuck Person and, yes, Christian Laettner and J.R. Rider.

Good news, though: The 38 point margin of defeat wasn't a record.

Not even close.

Three points shy of the 41 points they lost by to the Warriors in November and at Miami in1996.

But here's my favorite statistical tidbit of the night:

The Suns scored 35 points or more in all four quarters for the first time since....1972.

The last time they did that was March 21, 1972 in a 160-128 victory over Portland.

About the only thing memorable for the Wolves tonight:

Corey Brewer's made-for-SportsCenter (had to be the No. 1 tonight) one-handed hammer slam smack in converging Robin Lopez's face in the second quarter.

Remember's Brewer's rising slam over Derek Fisher in L.A. in December?

Which one do you think is better? I can't quite decide.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wntt12w5iF4

Other than that -- and another Brewer slam later when Steve Nash tried to catch him -- well...

After the game, Ryan Gomes stared blankly at approaching reporters as if to say, "What in the world can you say about that one."

Then he said, "You can't win letting a team score 150."

Really?

Maybe that was their problem.

"We fell into the trap of playing how they wanted to play," Gomes said.

Kevin Love returned after missing two games with that sprained left foot. He played 26 minutes, didn't make a shot (0 for 7), had three points and seven rebounds and got clobbered most of the night by Louis Amendson, who had 20 points and seven rebounds off the bench.

"Amundson comes in and he just plays hard," Kurt Rambis said. "He gets 20 points in 20 minutes and however many rebounds he got not because he's doing anything fancy, he's just giving effort out there."

Love soaked his feet in ice after the game.

Oh, and one other thing I forgot:

Wolves now have lost 10 straight and 16 of their last 17.