LOS ANGELES — The buildup was well documented. The “Murray sucks” chants were deafening. The boos that reigned down on the Denver Nuggets’ 21-year-old point guard were constant. The result was potentially catastrophic.
The Nuggets fell 112-103 Tuesday to the Los Angeles Lakers. Denver trailed by 13 after the first quarter, by just one point at halftime and held a lead well into the fourth. Kyle Kuzma — who scored 24 of his 26 points in the second half — along with Julius Randle, also scored 26, dropped Denver to the 10th seed in the Western Conference and out of the playoff picture with 14 games remaining.
“I definitely think our defensive breakdowns contributed to his great looks,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said about Kuzma. “I give him credit, he stepped up and made them. But once again, we have to understand who we’re guarding. We have to understand what the game plan is and have much greater discipline in doing both of those things, guarding their players as well as their personnel.”
After the loss, players tried their hand at pinpointing exactly where things went wrong.
Backup center Mason Plumlee was adamant that Denver “just had some mental lapses.” Murray referenced the same “breakdowns” as his coach that allowed Kuzma and Randle to hurt the Nuggets in the third and fourth quarters. Nikola Jokic, who battled foul trouble for most of the night but still chipped in 15 points, nine rebounds, and five assists in 27 minutes, immediately cited “defensive rebounding.”
Denver’s coach put much of the blame for the loss on the Nuggets’ inability to close the third quarter. After Denver held a 13-point lead with 2:21 left in the period, the Lakers went on a 10-2 run to shrink Denver’s margin to five points heading to the fourth.
“The group that comes in to close those quarters has to come in and understand what they’re going into,” Malone said. “They have to execute better, they have to defend better, and they have to have a much better sense of urgency. I thought we had some guys out there in that end of third quarter that were not ready to play, and that hurt us.”
The Nuggets have suffered tough defeats all season. Tuesday’s was as difficult as they come. In the heat of a playoff battle where the eighth-seeded Utah Jazz have won 19 of their last 21 games and the seventh-seeded Los Angeles Clippers have rattled off wins in seven of their past nine, Denver can’t afford many more losses.
Nine of the Nuggets’ 14 remaining games are on the road. Denver has won just 11 games away from Pepsi Center all season.
Denver hasn’t lost hope, nor should they. Injuries can hit their competition. Teams can go fall off at the drop of a hat. The Nuggets’ locker room is still confident, but the odds are stacked against them.
“Still 14 games left, it’s not over. I don’t think it’s over,” Jokic said. “We have a lot of games to play. We need to still keep getting better. I think we’re on the right way. We just need to stay focused for 48 minutes.”
