Michael Malone says a playoff berth won’t determine if Nuggets are successful this season

DENVER — The Nuggets entered the 2017-18 regular season with heightened expectations after signing free agent Paul Millsap to a three-year, $90 million contract and returned a young core featuring Nikola Jokic, Gary Harris and Jamal Murray. Denver also brought back three out of its five starters from last year’s 40-win team that fell a game short of qualifying for the playoffs.

With 14 games remaining, missing the playoffs for a fifth consecutive season is a real possibility for the Nuggets and coach Michael Malone, who’s wrapping up his third season in Denver. The Nuggets (37-31) enter Thursday’s matchup against the Pistons (30-37) as losers of three of their past five games and are a game back of the final playoff spot in the West.

Malone said Thursday that a potential playoff berth won’t determine if this Nuggets’ season is a success or failure. He’s more focused on the upward trajectory that his team has shown in each of his three seasons on the job.

“I don’t think so. Not for me,” Malone said when asked if making or missing the playoffs will define the season. “There’s been so many areas that we’ve grown and improved that if you just make it cut-throat, black and white, playoffs or bust, I think you’re doing a lot of guys a disservice. I know for myself, I know for (Nuggets president of basketball operations) Tim Connelly, we never went into this season that this was a playoff-or-bust season, and I think you could see that in terms of how we went about the season, the moves we made, it wasn’t all, ‘We gotta get in.’

“There’s no desperation here. There’s definitely hopes. We all want it. It was a goal of ours, so it would be a huge disappointment if we did not make the playoffs, and I don’t even want to think about it, to be honest with you. But if in a month-and-a-half we find ourselves on the outside looking in, the disappointment will be there for a long time. But I think it’s also important to take stock of all the positive things that we accomplished along the way, and as long as you’re improving in this business, I think that’s all that matters and you’re not regressing. If you continue to improve we’ll get there, and I think it’s going to happen this year. I really do.”

The Nuggets face a grueling final month of the regular season. Denver plays nine of its final 14 on the road. The Nuggets are just 11-21 away from Pepsi Center this season. Those 11 wins are the fewest road victories of any playoff hopeful.

Denver’s best road wins of the season were in late-December on back-to-back nights against the Trail Blazers and Warriors. The Nuggets also got an impressive road victory in Milwaukee the day before the All-Star break and against the Cavaliers on March 3.

The Nuggets’ seven other road wins came against the Hawks, Nets, Kings, Magic, Suns, Grizzlies and Pistons.

“For me it’s exciting,” Malone said of the stressful postseason push. “Because when you look at it, I think going into the year people felt we were a team that could make the playoffs. We were a team that can win like low-mid 40’s roughly. And that was with Paul Millsap, and he missed 44 games. We’re still in the same boat. That’s exciting to me. That says to me this team has grown, this team has a lot of talent and you look at the young core that we have.

“So I don’t look at it like ‘Oh my gosh are we going to make the playoffs?’ I say ‘Wow. What a great opportunity for a young team’ that in my eyes is ahead of expectations. Enjoy the process, enjoy the moment and go out there and have fun with it.”

Malone recently took Trey Lyles aside and told to his young power forward that he “just has to play” amidst the end-of-season stretch run. Denver wouldn’t be where they are this season if it wasn’t for Lyles, who stepped in while Millsap missed more than three months with a left wrist injury.

When Millsap returned, Lyles’ role decreased and his efficiency plummeted. Lyles is shooting just 36.6 percent from the field and 14.3 percent from three across eight games with Millsap back in the fold. He’s averaging 13.8 minutes over that span — down from the 19.5 per game he logged in February. In December and January Lyles averaged 27.5 and 25.5 minutes per game respectively.

“How do we handle those pressures and stresses? By staying together, staying positive, showing leadership,” Malone said. “And if I’m uptight, and if I’m nervous, they’re only going to feed off that. So I think it’s important for myself — one thing I keep telling myself is, ‘Just don’t be negative. Be positive.’ Yes we have to coach, we have to teach, we have to hold guys accountable but make sure we’re making it a very light atmosphere, no one feels like everything feels life and death. And I think if we do that, guys will start to play games as opposed to run out there and playing tight or being afraid to lose. We can’t play that way. It’s tough to play like that.”

While the Nuggets have won 11 of their last 17, their competition for one of the remaining playoff spot is fierce. The seventh and eighth-seeded Los Angeles Clippers and Utah Jazz are a combined 15-5 in their last 20 games. On Tuesday, both the Jazz and Clippers won. The Spurs, who are currently ninth in the West, also won. The fifth-seeded Minnesota Timberwolves and the sixth-seeded New Orleans Pelicans, who both sit 2 1/2 games ahead of Denver, were also victorious. The Nuggets fell that night 112-103 to the Lakers.

“I want to say no, but when (five) teams win and you lose, it’s tough not to see that or it’s tough to put that in the back of your mind, so it’s definitely some pressure whether we like it or not whether we accept it or not,” Millsap said. “Like I said earlier, we can only take it one game at a time.”

Whatever pressures Malone and his team may or may not be feeling, they’d surely be amplified if the Nuggets drop another winnable game to the Pistons. Detroit is just 7-11 after trading for Blake Griffin and are five games behind the Miami Heat for the Eastern Conference’s final playoff spot.

“I would hate to get on an airplane tomorrow with a loss tonight,” Malone said.