Melodrama, debilitating injuries and organizational turnover: After years of suffering, the Nuggets are finally back on course

Melodrama. The second-leading scorer on their most successful regular-season team ever shredding his knee two weeks before the playoffs. Waving goodbye to the reigning Executive of the Year. Firing the reigning Coach of the Year. Following along on social media as their star player smoked hookah and declared his days in Denver were numbered on draft night as they chose his successor, who turned out to be a bust.

The suffering — some of it self-inflicted, some of it awful luck — the Denver Nuggets endured to get back to the postseason and advance was immense. They are moving on to the Western Conference Semifinals for the first time in a decade thanks to an anxiety-inducing 90-86 Game 7 win over the San Antonio Spurs. The road it took to taste postseason success again was full of wrong turns, potholes and blown-over trees, but after years of traversing bumpy trails, the Nuggets are finally back on course.

When Michael Malone accepted the head coaching job here in 2015, he was asked to whip into shape a team was canceling shootarounds because too many players liked to party. Things were so bad, fans stopped coming out.

“When you looked in the stands, it was Witness Protection Night,” Malone said. “There was nobody here. In four years, (we’ve) built this from within, built this internally with really good people, high-character people. Being a team that won a Game 7 at home and advancing to the second round is incredible. It’s almost surreal at times. And our fans have been phenomenal.”

The Nuggets were dead last in home attendance during Malone’s first two years in charge. This season, they ranked 12th. The 19,725 who crammed into Pepsi Center on Saturday were so loud, the Spurs couldn’t hear coach Gregg Popovich screaming to intentionally foul with less than 20 seconds remaining and Denver up four.

“We had the best home record in the NBA this year, yes, because we have very good players,” Malone said, “but more importantly, our fans showed up and made this a tremendously difficult place to play in.”

The reason your ears ring when you see a Nuggets game at Pepsi Center again? A group of players who don’t scare anyone by themselves but collectively have grown into something formidable. Nikola Jokic, the goofy engine that makes Denver go, was asleep at home in Serbia when Denver picked him 41st overall in 2014. Paul Millsap, Will Barton and Monte Morris were also all second-round picks. Torrey Craig didn’t even get drafted and was content to play out his pro career overseas before the Nuggets plucked him out of Australia. Jamal Murray, the shooting guard in a point guard’s body who came from a small town in Canada, was the highest draft pick in Denver’s rotation that downed San Antonio.

“It’s been a journey,” said Murray, who scored 16 of his game-high 23 points in the second half. “A lot of ups and down. I think the biggest thing is we just enjoy playing with each other. It’s been a lot of fun.”

The Nuggets missed the playoffs by razor-thin margins during Murray’s first two seasons. In the locker room following the Game 82 loss to Minnesota a year ago, Murray vowed the Nuggets wouldn’t be in the position of having to sweat out a playoff berth. Doing so, he understood, meant they actually need to commit on defense.

“We learned from the past two years not making the playoffs that we had to change something,” Murray said. “We knew that our offense wasn’t gonna beat teams every single night.”

After three straight seasons as a bottom-seven defensive team, the Nuggets vaulted to 10th in 2018-19. They ranked first in 3-point defense and fourth-quarter defense during the regular season. Finally figuring out how to put the clamps on opponents allowed them to survive a 2-of-20 shooting night from 3 in Game 7. The Nuggets limited the Spurs to 36.5% shooting in the series-deciding game, and in Denver’s four first-round wins, it held San Antonio to 96 points per game.

“This series, every time we played a little bit of defense we won the game,” said Nikola Jokic, who had 21 points, 15 rebounds and 10 assists in the closeout effort. “Every time we put some effort on the defensive effort we were winning the game.”

Jokic, the clear-cut MVP of the series, was brilliant on the offensive end as the Spurs threw all sorts of different coverages at him. Across seven games, he averaged 23.1 points on 48.8% shooting, 12.1 rebounds and 9.1 assists. Equally impressive, though, was his strong defensive play. Jokic helped limit LaMarcus Aldridge to a 6-of-16 performance in Game 7 and 45.5% shooting in the series.

“Our defense was incredible, especially in that first half,” Malone said. “But we couldn’t make a shot. We were unable to take advantage our of defense because we couldn’t make shots.”

Nothing was falling and Denver won anyway — a sign that the Nuggets, who face Portland in the Western Conference Semifinals, can keep this going. Postseason success requires teams to play well on both ends of the floor. These aren’t your father’s Nuggets, who won with the smoke-and-mirrors approach of running and gunning at altitude. Jokic and this wacky group pick teams apart in the half court and hunker down on defense when they need to.

The Nuggets now have their first playoff series win of this new era. Malone, Jokic, Murray and others have transformed this franchise from punchline to postseason threat. After so many missteps and tough breaks, a window to contention is starting to crack open.