Nuggets game day: Why Denver's road trip will have ramifications beyond this season

The Memphis Grizzlies haven’t won a professional basketball game since Jan. 29. That’s 46 days, more than six weeks and 19 games since the Grizzlies saw their name on the right side of the scoreboard when the buzzer sounded.

On Thursday against the Chicago Bulls, the Grizzlies nearly ended the league’s longest losing streak of the season. Leading by one point with 1.8 seconds remaining, Tyreke Evans mistakenly fouled Bulls’ guard Antonio Blakeney while he attempted a three. Blakeney converted two of his three free-throws and handed Memphis another crushing defeat — their 19th straight.

“Did they win tonight?” Nuggets coach Michael Malone asked the media after Denver’s 120-113 win over the Detroit Pistons on Thursday. “19 in a row? Alright.”

Malone knows the Grizzlies are chomping at the bit to end their losing streak, which is tied for the 13th-longest in league history. Malone’s also aware of what’s at stake over Denver’s next seven games but won’t allow himself to look past Memphis.

“Everybody’s talking about the seven-game trip and I understand why. It’s gonna be a big thing,” Malone said. “But we can’t look at it as a seven-game trip. It’s Memphis right now.”

If the Nuggets perform well away from home, they’ll come back to Pepsi Center with the ability to control their own destiny over the final six games of the regular season. Denver will take on the Minnesota Timberwolves twice and the Los Angeles Clippers once over their final six matchups — two teams the Nuggets are fighting with for one of the final playoff spots in the Western Conference.

But Denver is just 11-21 on the road this season and those 11 wins are the fewest among any playoff hopeful. If the Nuggets return from the road trip three or four games behind the seventh and eighth seeds in the West, Denver is likely looking at its fifth consecutive season without a playoff appearance. That will not sit well with a fan base desperate for postseason basketball.

Defense will be a priority for the Nuggets against Memphis and over the next seven games. Denver is the 26th-ranked defense in the league this season and as a team, the Nuggets have been statistically worse on that end of the floor since defensive anchor Paul Millsap returned from a 44-game absence.

However, with Millsap on the floor, Denver has held its own. The Nuggets give up an average of 104.2 points per 100 possessions with Millsap but that number balloons to 118.7 points per 100 possessions when he sits.

Millsap himself said he’s never been on a seven-game road trip throughout his 12-year career.

“We’ve got to be hungry for every single win, especially at this point,” Millsap said. “At this point were not in the playoffs so we just got to work our way back in. It starts with them. Come in and just take care of business.”

In the two team’s last meeting on March 2 which amounted to a 108-102 Nuggets’ win, the Grizzlies only dressed 10 players. Memphis was without Tyreke Evans, JaMychal Green and Andrew Harrison. Harrison is questionable for Saturday’s matchup but Evens and Green both return to the Grizzlies’ lineup looking for a win.

Nuggets Projected Starters

Jamal Murray, Gary Harris, Wilson Chandler, Paul Millsap, Nikola Jokic

Grizzlies Projected Starters

Tyreke Evans, Dillon Brook, JaMychal Green, Jarell Martin, Marc Gasol