Maybe the Nuggets left their offense on the golden sand beaches of Cabo San Lucas or whatever temperate climate they traveled to during the All-Star break, because Denver’s offensive attack just hadn’t brought the same amount of heat over the last couple of weeks it did prior to last month’s week-long vacation.
The Nuggets selfless brand of basketball had turned selfish. Post-All-Star break, hero ball had infected portions of Denver’s locker room. The Nuggets had traded in their democratic, equal-opportunity brand of basketball for a 1-on-1, your turn, my turn half-court attack. Perhaps South Beach drained the Nuggets of their offensive identity. In Denver’s last eight games prior to Tuesday’s matchup with Minnesota, the Nuggets ranked 20th in offense, a far cry from the third-ranked attack they sported prior to All-Star weekend.
Returning to their unselfish ways had been a focal point all week both in film sessions and on Denver’s practice court. And prior to the Nuggets taking the floor for warmups Tuesday night, Michael Malone offered one final refresher to remind his team how they look when they’re at their best: a series of 10 offensive clips that were played in the locker room showing just how dangerous the Nuggets can be on that end of the floor when they play for one another, not just themselves and moves the ball.
Message received.
The Nuggets looked like their pre-All-Star break selves against the Timberwolves. Denver toppled Minnesota 133-107 as the Nuggets handed out a season-high 40 assists (their most since 2013) on 51 made baskets, and shot a glistening 60 percent from both the field and three.
“Anytime you have success, winning, guys are playing well, you have a lot of talent. It’s never from a selfish place, but everyone wants to just do good and stand out and stay out on the court,” Will Barton said, philosophizing around how Nuggets had lost their offensive identity but managed to rediscovered it against the Timberwolves. “Sometimes you can get lost in that and try to make plays for yourself. It’s a long season and things like that happen. And then you just get reeled back in.”
If the Nuggets’ last-minute film session was Malone casting his rod and hoping for a bite, he felt a sharp tug on his line in Tuesday’s first quarter. Denver tallied 11 assists on 14 made baskets in the game’s first 12 minutes. Nikola Jokic, who had seen his touches per game drop as the Nuggets had lost four out of their last five, was once again the fulcrum of Denver’s attack. Jokic scored or assisted on seven of the Nuggets’ first 10 baskets.
As a team, the Nuggets made 366 passes against the Timberwolves, per Second Spectrum, well above their season average of 308 per game.
“Everybody was sharing the ball, everybody makes everybody happy,” said Nikola Jokic. “We made a lot of shots, assisted, so we played the right way.”
The Nuggets’ offense was in dire need of a jump start with only 16 regular season games remaining, and the Bomb Cyclone — a winter storm that’s equivalent to a category 1 hurricane — making landfall over Colorado on Wednesday morning and threatening to freeze over Denver’s attack for good. Once the middle of March hits, it’s “a sprint” to the finish, as Jamal Murray put it.
The Nuggets readied themselves for the regular season stretch run by tweaking their rotation, something Malone had been dropping hints about for the last couple of weeks as Denver struggled to find itself during the dog days of the season.
The most notable adjustment was no Isaiah Thomas, who didn’t play for the first time since he made his Nuggets debut back on Feb. 13. Removing Thomas from the rotation wasn’t an easy call for Malone, who spoke with the veteran point guard before ultimately ending the two-week experiment and leaving him on the bench, but as Denver’s coach put it, “that’s my job.” The Nuggets only played eight players in the first quarter. Torrey Craig earned spot minutes throughout the night. Expect the Nuggets to maintain their playoff-ready rotation for the rest of the regular season.
No Thomas meant significant minutes for Murray and Monte Morris together in the Nuggets’ backcourt. The two logged 13 minutes alongside one another versus Minnesota, and the Nuggets outscored the Timberwolves by 12 points when those two played. It’s a look Malone likes. It allows Murray to play off the ball, where he thrives, and for Morris, a classical point guard, to take on more ball-handling duties.
The adjustment led to more healthy offense. Morris and Murray quickly rekindled the chemistry that the two had struck on Denver’s practice court over the summer when they made a point to play together in pickup games. Murray, who played shooting guard during his one season at Kentucky, is a natural when coming off pin-downs and weaving through screens in the half-court. Thanks in part to an 11-point third quarter flurry, Murray finished with a game-high 30 points on 10-16 shooting. Morris assembled a conventional 16-point, five-rebound, six-assist stat line in 27 minutes.
The two lead ball handlers were more than willing to incorporate the Nuggets’ bigs into their offensive attack too. Denver shot 11-13 on what it calls paint threes, when the ball gets into the painted are via a pass or dribble before getting kicked out to the perimeter for a shot.
“Once we get into a paint you’ve got to be cognizant of the lob to Mason, or the pocket pass to Nikola, and that makes their defense shift,” said Morris. “So when I get in the paint, or anybody gets in the paint, you can drive and kick because they’re going to help.”
The Nuggets played with a verve for most of four quarters that they hadn’t displayed for prolonged stretches. Their spirit? It returned. Their pace? Denver played with a purpose for most of four quarters. Yet, the feeling inside the Nuggets’ locker room is still that Denver, as it gets adjusted to an eight and a half man playoff rotation, can play much better than it did Tuesday.
“Not me personally,” Barton said when asked if the Nuggets had reached their peak yet. “I don’t know how anyone else feels, but I don’t feel like it. Even tonight, we played well but in spurts we still had let-downs.”
