Jamal Murray's Sacramento stunner didn't take Gary Harris by surprise

Jamal Murray had already poured in 30 second-half points in just 21 minutes on two bad ankles and with bumps and bruises up and down his 21-year-old body that would typically land any point guard on the injury report for at least a couple weeks. Yet there he stood, at the midcourt line hunched over at the waist in his acclaimed Be More sneakers, which reminds the point guard to fight through any adversity life throws his way both on and off the court, looking for one last dagger.

Murray couldn’t possibly have anything left. It looked like he tweaked his right ankle earlier in the game, and he limped towards De’Aaron Fox exhausted and physically drained. But Murray was hungry for the finishing shot. He had that familiar look in his eye. You know, the one that you’ll typically see late in games when Murray senses a big moment on the stage he’s been preparing to stand at the center of for all his life.

There’s always a sense of calm that Murray brings to the game in those situations. Somehow the kid who’s supposed to be a senior in college manages to stay incredibly poised when the lights are the brightest. The waning moments of Thursday night’s thrilling 117-113 Nuggets in Sacramento that lifted Denver to its best start in franchise history were no different.

After crossing into the front court, Murray ran off a Nikola Jokic ball screen, stopped at the top of the key, squared his two feet to the basket and let go his last arrow from his quiver.

Bullseye.

Murray crumbled to the hardwood, absorbing a Willie Cauley-Stein foul, but still kept an eye fixed on what would be his sixth three-pointer of the half, his fourth of the quarter, this one so smooth that it barely budged the nylon. He rose and strutted towards center court yelling a few choice words that only Kings fans who had paid top dollar to watch the best team in the Western Conference play on their turf could hear.

He walked all the way towards the opposite free throw line, mouth yapping, letting off some steam, and perhaps some frustration from what’s been an up and down season to this point for a player many had pegged as a frontrunner for the league’s Most Improved Player award. Murray shot just 30 percent from three over his first 15 games of the season and through the end of November was hitting only 31 percent of his triples. The myriad of injuries to his ankles, shins and legs seemed to be getting the better of him.

His teammates never seemed concerned.

“I feel like every time he shoots, it’s going to go in,” Gary Harris said the morning after Murray struggled through a 4-19 night shooting the ball against San Antonio where he went just 1-8 from three-point land. “When he does make shots he can have damn near 50 points. I don’t think anybody’s really worried about that at all.”

A week later, anyone who questioned Murray’s shooting prowess wishes they could have their words back. Following his clunker against the Spurs, Murray came right off Denver’s late-night charter home and checked into basketball rehab: the Nuggets’ practice court for a 2 a.m. shooting session. The next night he scored 31 points and hit 4 of 7 threes against that same San Antonio team and put 46 points on the Phoenix Suns two nights later on just 24 shots, game in which he sunk 9 of 11 threes. He stayed quiet in his next outing against the Knicks and looked to be headed for another ho-hum showing Thursday in Sacramento. But after scoring two points in the first half, he unleashed another Murray special.

It started with a personal 8-0 run at the beginning of the third quarter to bring Denver back from a 13-point halftime deficit to within four points a few minutes into the second half. He tallied nine more points in the quarter and registered 17 more in the fourth, the final three of his night coming on the memorable and-1 to lift the conference-leading Nuggets to their 25th win of the season and 10th victory away from home, which didn’t come until March 2nd last year.

Since Harris brushed off his backcourt partner’s supposed slump, Murray is averaging a cool 30 points on 54 percent shooting from the field, 58 percent from three, 5.5 rebounds and 5.5 assists over his last four games. He had 14 of Denver’s final 24 points of the night and 17 of the 33 points the Nuggets tallied in Thursday’s fourth quarter, more late-game heroics that have become routine for Murray over the last month. He’s raised his three-point percentage from 28.5 to 33.5 percent over the last four games.

Behind Murray, who’s scored the 13th-most clutch points (when the score is within five points with five minutes or less remaining) in the league since Dec. 1, and Nikola Jokic, who’s shooting 10-19 from the field in clutch situations since that same date, the Nuggets have developed into the best closers in the league. On the season, Denver has a league-high 17 clutch wins and is a league-best 8-2 in games decided by four points or less. Since Dec. 1, Murray (+40) and Jokic (+36) have the two best clutch plus-minuses in the league.

Murray finished the night with a game-high 36 points in Sacramento, 34 of which came in the second half. It was the most points scored in a half from a Nuggets player since Carmelo Anthony had 36 in a half in 2008. Denver’s closer was in one of those zones Thursday that oozed 2015-16 Curry, 2012-13 LeBron or 2018-19 Harden. Like his backcourt partner, I thought every time Murray put it up over the course of the second half in Sacramento it was going in.

The only question is when is he going to do it again?