PORTLAND, Ore., April 10 (Ticker) -- Ruben Patterson's return to Portland ended with him being part of a division champion.

Patterson scored 21 points and Marcus Camby enjoyed a big second half as the Denver Nuggets clinched the Northwest Division title with a 110-98 victory over the Portland Trail Blazers.

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Carmelo Anthony scored 28 points to pace the Nuggets (44-34), who won their first division title since capturing the Midwest crown in 1988. Denver will be the third seed in the Western Conference playoffs.

"It feels good and I like it," Nuggets coach George Karl said. "This tonight, is just the beginning. I think the playofffs we'll have to fight harder and figure some things out, but this is a good feeling.

"We had some nice contributions tonight. Marcus was incredible in the second half, both offensively and defensively. Ruben gave us a lot of energy and was good as well."

Patterson spent parts of five seasons with the Blazers before being dealt to the Nuggets at the February trade deadline. The man nicknamed "Captain Chaos" wrecked some havoc against his old team, making 9-of-13 shots 28 minutes.

"I told coach Karl that you got to let me loose tonight and if I start acting up you can put me back in my cage," said Patterson, who talked his way into the starting lineup. "I was kinda ready for this game and got a lot of sleep last night. If we would have lost against them I would have been devastated. The good thing is we didn't and we clinched our division, so I'm happy right now."

Anthony scored 17 points and Patterson 13 in a tight first half that ended with the Nuggets holding a 56-52 lead.

"It was kind of crazy in the first half with all the runs by each team, but we are the type of team that can do what's necessary to come out a establish control," Patterson said. "There is a lot of difference between this team and (Portland). We have veterans and guys who compete. It's nice to be here."

Camby helped the Nuggets open a cushion in the third quarter, when he scored 15 of his 21 points. Behind Camby, who also finished with 13 rebounds, Denver held an 84-69 advantage entering the final period.

"I just told the guys at halftime that we need to step it up and we have to put some distance between us and the Trail Blazers," Camby said. "I had the hot hand and my teammates did a good job of finding me. I was open, and I always tell my teammates to shoot the ball when they're open. Today I was in a good rhythm."

Voshon Lenard scored a season-high 21 points and Sebastian Telfair also had 21 for Portland (21-56), which lost for the 14th time in 15 games. Lenard was in the deal that sent Patterson to Denver.

"You can't turn the ball over 24 times and win," Trail Blazers coach Nate McMillan said. "We were just trying to do too much and we weren't recognizing what they were doing to us defensively. I certainly expected them to scrap like they did but we made too many mistakes and too many turnovers to pull it off."