Nuggets move on, seemingly with no limit on what they can accomplish
Nuggets move on, seemingly with no limit on what they can accomplish
What Denver accomplished by winning this series in six games is significant heading into the Western Conference finals. The Nuggets will have four days off. Four days of rest and recovery. With the Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors series still in play, there is a chance that Denver will have a rest advantage heading into its next matchup.
The turning point to Denver’s season, the night head coach Michael Malone knew he had something special on his hands, came a few weeks before Christmas.
It was Dec. 8, to be exact. The Nuggets escaped a road game against the Portland Trail Blazers that night, point guard Jamal Murray hitting the game winner and running off the court in celebratory fashion. That was the night Malone realized Jamal Murray was back. Not just back on the court and healed from the ACL tear that cost him almost two seasons. But back to the Jamal Murray he had been before the injury. And that was the night the Denver Nuggets jelled as a whole.
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They would quickly ascend to the top of the Western Conference standings after that night in Portland, spending over 100 days at the top of a conference that went through upheaval below them. That was the night the Nuggets started playing basketball at such a high level that they were basically able to comfortably jog their way to the regular-season finish line by the time March rolled around.
• “That was the night that we were reminded of Jamal’s greatness,” Malone said. “It was also a jumpstart for us as a team. We started playing really well after that night.”
• If anything, that’s a reminder of why the regular season still matters, of why a random December game can be important to a team on a macro level. The Denver Nuggets obliterated the Phoenix Suns 125-100 on Thursday night, taking Game 6 of a Western Conference semifinal, and advancing to the Western Conference finals for the first time since 2020.
They scored 17 consecutive points to bridge the first and second quarters. They scored 81 points in the first half. They led by 30 at halftime. They played so well, the sellout crowd at Footprint Center booed the home team into the locker room at the end of the second quarter.
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These Nuggets walk, run, talk and play with a swagger that belies almost any Nuggets team in franchise history. Ask them if they can win a title. The look they give you will tell you what they think of the question. It’s not arrogance. It’s a team that knows how well it’s played all season and is now just seeing many in the outside world catching up.
• “We’ve believed that we can be this good since 2019,” Murray said. “We just needed to be healthy.”
• That led to their facing the Minnesota Timberwolves, a series they won in five games. That gave them a three-day rest, which they used to win the first two games of the series against the Suns. They lost the next two games in Phoenix, by a combined 12 points, which led the Nuggets to believe they didn’t take advantage of multiple opportunities.
• Denver proved to be the better team against the Suns. The deeper team. The more experienced team. The team that knew what it was trying to accomplish on every possession on both ends of the floor. And, ultimately, that’s what led to Thursday night’s blowout. The Suns were gassed and clearly playing with dead legs. Phoenix superstar Kevin Durant missed nine of his first 10 shots, many of those misses on looks he normally makes. Star shooting guard Devin Booker went 4-of-13 from the field, slowing down significantly toward the end of the series, where he was all but unstoppable at the front end of the series.
• The Nuggets wore them down. Their depth and plethora of defenders eventually got to Durant and Booker. On offense, the Nuggets made those two work on every possession, and eventually it became difficult for Phoenix to match what Denver was doing on both sides of the floor.
• “We wanted to be the aggressors tonight,” Malone said. “We didn’t want to be the ones who had to counter. I thought our defense was beautiful tonight. To hold that team to 100 points, that was a great job by our guys defensively.”
• What Denver accomplished by winning this series in six games is significant heading into the Western Conference finals. The Nuggets will have four days off. Four days of rest and recovery. With the Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors series still in play, there is a chance that Denver will have a rest advantage heading into its next matchup.
• The depth, the versatility, the top-end talent, it all leads to the possibility that this is the Nuggets team that can accomplish something special. Thursday night, Nikola Jokic notched another postseason triple-double, scoring 32 points, handing out 12 assists and grabbing 10 rebounds. His series against Phoenix defies general thought. He averaged 34 points per game in the series, to go along with 13 rebounds and 10 assists. He shot 61 percent from the field. He shot 44 percent from 3-point range. He was the best player in the series by miles and miles.
• Phoenix had no answer for him. If they doubled him in the post, he found the open man. If they played him straight up, he scored with ease. He controlled the rebounding game. He was the best playmaker in the series. If Denver’s depth and versatility are reasons for the postseason ceiling being so high, the Nuggets may just also have the best player in the world. And if you have the best player in any series that you are going to play, then you have a fighting chance in any series that you’re going to play.
• “It’s been a pleasure playing with these guys,” Jokic said. “Hopefully, we can do something nice.”
