This is why the Nuggets signed Paul Millsap

MINNEAPOLIS — Nuggets coach Michael Malone along with president of basketball operations Tim Connelly and general manager Arturas Karnisovas sat three abreast more than six months ago at Media Day and stressed that defense was their team’s No. 1 priority heading into a season with lofty expectations.

“Defense, defense, defense,” Malone said when describing what the message was to his players at their inaugural team dinner.

Those expectations got a hard dose of reality just 16 games into the season when marquee free agent signing Paul Millsap went down with a left wrist injury that required surgery and sidelined the power forward for more than three months. As expectations gradually tempered without Millsap, so did Denver’s defense, which settled into the bottom-five standing that’s become familiar territory for the Nuggets.

Millsap has played 21 games since he returned from injury. Denver is 13-8 with him back in the rotation and just reeled off a six-game winning streak against teams that were a combined 64 games over .500 to save its season. The Nuggets are also winning games the way Malone and Millsap envisioned when the 33-year-old signed his name on the dotted line last summer.

Since the Nuggets’ 126-125 overtime win over the Thunder, Denver is the 16th-best defense in the league. The Nuggets are holding oppnents to just 105.9 points per 100 possessions over the six-game win streak — a stark improvement from the 109.2 points per 100 possessions Denver allowed in the 44 games Millsap missed. The Nuggets are still posting the league’s third-best offense over their recent win streak.

In the Nuggets’ 88-82 grind-it-out win over the Trail Blazers, Denver held Portland to 33 percent shooting from the field and 7-33 (21.2 percent) from three. The Nuggets outscored the Trail Blazers 22-13 in the fourth quarter and limited Portland to under 30 percent shooting over the game’s final 12 minutes.

Millsap, who’s regarded as Denver’s defensive captain, traffic cop and conductor, was on the court for the entire quarter. With Millsap on the floor during their win streak, the Nuggets are allowing opponents to score 106.6 points per 100 possessions. When he sits, that number rises to 109.6 points per 100 possessions.

“Some of the best defense we’ve played this year,” Malone said.

The Nuggets would prefer to play better on the offensive end of the floor than they did against the Trail Blazers. And they’ll need to in order to come out on the right side of Wednesday’s play-in game against the Timberwolves (6:00 p.m., ALT). The winner of the matchup goes to the playoffs. The loser starts their summer vacation early.

But this is the exact type of defensive effort that Malone and Denver’s top brass expected from a Millsap-led unit when they opened training camp in September. Finally, it’s coming to fruition.

After the Nuggets suffered a then-debilitating 122-120 defeat at the hands of Boban Marjanovic and the Clippers on Feb. 27 — the 33-year-old’s first game back from a 44-game absence — Millsap took an oath at his locker to improve Denver’s defense.

He’s successfully backed up that pledge.

“This whole year we’ve been trying to establish that identity. We’ve always been an offensive-minded team. Now we’re just going to buckle down and lock in on defense, and tonight was a prime example of what we can do when we play defense,” Millsap said after the Nuggets’ win over the Trail Blazers. “When your offense isn’t going right every game and you can’t make shots, you gotta find a way to win games.”

If the Nuggets beat the Timberwolves and make the playoffs for the first time in four seasons, they’ll need that same defensive mindset to challenge the Warriors — Denver’s probable first-round opponent. To get there, the Nuggets will rely on their veteran for the same defensive presence he’s brought during Denver’s late-season surge.

That’s also why the Nuggets inked Millsap to a three-year, $90 million contract this summer. On a team whose four other starters have a combined 18 games of playoff experience, Millsap boasts a wealth of experience in high-pressure situations.

“There’s nothing I can say until they get into it,” Millsap said when asked if he can prepare Denver’s young core for Wednesday’s elimination game.

Luckily for Jamal Murray, Gary Harris and Nikola Jokic, most of the Nuggets’ recent victories have been of the must-win variety. Millsap called Monday’s win over the Trail Blazers “beyond playoff-physical.”

“I think we’re playing our best overall basketball,” Millsap said. “Not necessarily the best offense that we’ve played all year, not necessarily the best defense, but to be a really good team you’ve got to have good balance. Now especially coming down the stretch, we have a good balance. Offense and defense. That’s what we need. We can’t just be one-sided.