Gary Harris ties career-high as Nuggets burn Suns 134-111

A few days of rest did Gary Harris well.

After looking “fatigued and tired” according to Denver Nuggets coach Michael Malone during the Nuggets’ 107-102 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers on Saturday, Harris recovered to tie his career-high in points Wednesday night in Denver’s 134-111 win over the Phoenix Suns.

Harris scored 20 points in the first quarter on a clean 9-10 shooting and finished with 36 on the night to lead Denver. The Nuggets’ starting shooting guard had a chance to set a new career-high in the fourth but couldn’t convert on three-pointer from the wing with 2:33 left in the game. Malone subbed out his starters a few possessions later.

“Gary Harris just had one of those nights,” Malone said. “The start that he got off to was incredible.”

Despite Harris’ first quarter, Denver fell behind Phoenix during a sluggish second quarter where the Nuggets were outscored 41-27 and allowed Phoenix to shoot 16-21 (76.2 percent) from the field and 6-8 from three.

“I was really direct at halftime,” Malone said after the win. “And that second quarter they shot 76 percent and scored 41 points. That’s embarrassing. We all should take that personally. Myself and the players on the floor.”

“Come on, we just needed to play defense,” Jokic said of Malone’s halftime message. “The offensive end was not a problem at all. We scored a lot, I mean 60-something. So we just needed to step up and play defense like we were playing the last couple of weeks.”

The Nuggets battled back in the third behind a 14-5 run to open the quarter which gave Denver an 85-75 lead with under three minutes to go before the fourth. That double-digit cushion carried the Nuggets through the rest of the game to a 23-point victory.

Elsewhere for Denver Nikola Jokic finished just shy of his first triple-double this season. Jokic scored 14 points to go with nine rebounds and eight assists. Wilson Chandler shot 7-9 from the field, 3-4 from three-point range and registered 17 points in 35 minutes. Will Barton, who was questionable leading up to tonight’s game with an illness, scored 12 points on 5-13 shooting.

“I got to give a lot of credit to Will Barton,” Malone said. “obviously he doesn’t make shootaround he’s sick, he’s got a temperature and he goes out there and I think plays great basketball for us off the bench especially in that second half.

All eyes were on Malone and who he’d insert into his rotation after pledging at Tuesday’s practice to trust his bench more. In Saturday’s loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, fatigue factored in heavily and the Nuggets’ seven or eight-man rotation, which they’ve played exclusively over the last few weeks, faltered.

Denver went 10-deep in the first quarter and inserted forward Kenneth Faried at center for a three-minute stretch. Faried played for the first time since the Nuggets’ 117-111 win over the New Orleans Pelicans back on Dec. 15. He hadn’t seen the floor in Denver’s past seven games.

Malik Beasley, who’s been in and out of the Nuggets’ rotation over the past few weeks, and Torrey Craig both saw their minutes increase as well.

Faried played six minutes and scored four points. Beasley logged 14 minutes and shot 4-5 from the field. He reached double-figures with 10 points.

“You never know when you’re going to play. six minutes or 15 minutes, I just knew that I had to go out there and compete and be ready, Beasley said.

“Kenneth comes in first play, gets a dunk, and one thing you know with Kenneth, he’s always going to bring his energy rebounding,” Malone said of his expanded bench. “I thought Malik did a really good job I think defensively. I thought we had great execution.”

The Nuggets host the Utah Jazz on Friday before a quick west coast road trip to Sacramento on Saturday and Golden State on Monday.