Nuggets game day: Denver hosts Detroit in final March home game

It was just a random third-quarter possession in a game that was already over, but Blake Griffin went through it with all the enthusiasm of Michael Scott being forced to interact with Toby Flenderson.

The Utah Jazz, who led the Detroit Pistons by 26 at the time, were whipping the basketball all over the floor. Griffin barely even bothered to move while it was going on. The possession ended with the Jazz misfiring on a wide-open three, but the clip still made the rounds on social media because of Griffin’s lack of engagement. Utah went on to win 110-79.

The Pistons pulled off a blockbuster trade to acquire Griffin about a month and a half ago. So far, Griffin’s tenure in Detroit hasn’t gone well. The Pistons are 7-11 with Griffin in the lineup, and their playoff odds in the Eastern Conference are looking grim. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Clippers, the team that traded Griffin away, have emerged from the breakup as a better team. They’re 12-5 since sending Griffin away and sit in seventh place out West.

On Thursday, the Nuggets will face the struggling Pistons at 7 p.m. at Pepsi Center (TV: Altitude). The Nuggets will try to wash their taste out of their mouths after a bitter defeat to the Los Angeles Lakers on Tuesday. Denver led L.A. by as many as 13 points in the second half but got outscored 35-21 in the fourth quarter.

The loss dropped the Nuggets to 10th in the Western Conference and bruised their playoff odds severely. Denver currently has just a 33 percent chance of snapping a four-season playoff drought, according to FiveThirtyEight.

The Nuggets desperately need a win. They need to feast over this next four-game stretch, which has them facing Detroit, Memphis, Miami and Chicago, because their final 10 games of the season all come against teams in position to make the playoffs.

“There are still 15 games left,” Nikola Jokic said Tuesday. “It’s not over. I don’t think that it’s over. We still have a lot of games to play. We need to still keep getting better. We just need to stay focused for 48 minutes.”

Denver plays its final home game of the month Thursday. The team hits the road for a seven-game road trip beginning Saturday. The Nuggets are 26-10 at home. They are 11-21 on the road. They’ll need to win away from Pepsi Center to have any shot of qualifying for the postseason.

Nuggets Projected Starters

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

Pistons Projected Starters

Ish Smith, Stanley Johnson, James Ennis, Blake Griffin, Andre Drummond