Tim Connelly made the most important statement of his tenure last week

Nuggets president of basketball operations Tim Connelly didn’t want to be standing in a hallway on the ground floor of Pepsi Center last week lamenting a second-straight season where his team finished one game shy of the playoffs. Ideally, Connelly and the rest of his front office would be readying themselves for a first-round matchup with the Warriors — Denver’s opponent had the Nuggets beaten the Timberwolves in last week’s winner-take-all game.

Yet there Connelly stood in front of a group of reporters, discussing a season that went awry for a number of reasons. But in doing so, the Nuggets’ top basketball decision maker made the most important statement of his tenure and one that shed a significant amount of light on the direction of the franchise that he’s overseen since the 2013-14 season.

“This is the most confident that I’ve felt in our core group since I’ve been here,” Connelly said. “I think we have the makings of a team that can enjoy sustainably high levels of success.”

Connelly is, of course, referring to the Nuggets’ starting center, point guard and shooting guard. All three sit at the center of a Nuggets’ core that’s expected to make the playoffs next season for the first time in Connelly’s five-year stint running Denver’s basketball operations.

Denver’s core trio starts and stops with Nikola Jokic. Jokic averaged career highs in points (18.5), rebounds (10.7) and assists (6.1). That stat line has only been posted by two other players: Wilt Chamberlain and Oscar Robertson. His numbers, as Nuggets coach Michael Malone put it late in the year, were a joke.

Jokic also converted 39.6 percent of his threes this season, a significant jump from the 32.4 percent he shot from three-point range last year.

“This was my best season, best in my whole life,” Jokic said. “It’s not just me, of course. It’s my teammates, it’s coaches, it’s trainers.”

Jokic carried his team back into playoff contention over Denver’s final 18 games. He averaged 24.0 points on 54.0 percent shooting from the field, 47.6 percent from three, 11.5 rebounds and 6.4 assists as the Nuggets finished the year 11-7.

Denver’s reliance on Jokic was never more evident than in its do-or-die season finale in Minnesota where Jokic tallied 35 points, 10 rebounds and three assists. Jokic’s 17-point third quarter where he shot a perfect 7-7 from the field, 3-3 from distance and hit one impossible shot after another was a perfect microcosm of the Serbian’s spectacular junior campaign.

In his third NBA season, the 23-year-old established himself as one of the league’s premier big men and is a legitimate candidate for an All-NBA team. Jokic is a transcendent offensive talent who’s just starting to crack the ceiling of what he can do on a basketball court.

The scary part? Jokic hasn’t played close to a full season at his natural position. He started last year playing next to Jusuf Nurkic at power forward and Denver trotted Jokic out alongside Mason Plumlee for 18 games this season.

He’s “the future of Denver Nugget basketball,” Malone declared.

Jokic will begin his offseason regimen in Denver before heading back to Serbia to rest before training camp next fall. Denver may elect to decline Jokic’s team option for next season making his a restricted free agent and sign the big man to a max-contract this summer. It’s the first of a few “pretty interesting financial decisions” the Nuggets will make this offseason, Connelly said last week.

The other two members of Denver’s core are in its backcourt. Jamal Murray, who just wrapped up his first year in the NBA as a full-time starting point guard, and Gary Harris, who for much of the season was considered the Nuggets’ Most Valuable Player, both came into their own this year.

On a team without an ‘alpha,’ Murray showed this season why he has the best chance on Denver’s current roster of filling that role. At just 21 years old, he’s already a killer on the court. Murray won’t back down from anyone and thrives on a big stage. He’s positioned to become the Nuggets’ leading scorer next season and de facto closer.

Murray’s far from a traditional point guard, but that works when he’s playing next to Jokic. The 6-foot-4 guard is an elite shooter. He hit 39 percent of his threes this season — a mark which slots Murray in the 84th percentile league-wide, per CleaningTheGlass.com. Murray also shot a pristine 90.4 percent from the line — the fifth-best percentage in the league — and hit 44 percent (88th percentile) of his field goal attempts from midrange. He has to get better finishing around the rim, however. Murray converted 59 percent of his shots around the basket, per CleaningTheGlass.com, a good percentage but definitely one he can improve upon.

Harris’ growth this past season may have been more significant than Murray’s. In 2018, Haris became a potent scorer off the dribble and showed off a significantly tighter handle as the year progressed. Harris averaged 17.5 points this season and led the Nuggets in scoring for much of the year until Jokic’s late-season surge.

His shooting percentages from both the field and three dipped slightly this season, but defenses were much more locked in on Harris and attuned to his scouting report this year compared to last. The biggest change in Harris’ game from last year to this year was where the 23-year-old got his offense from. In 2017, just 19 percent of Harris’ field goal attempts came from midrange. This season, that number rose to 28 percent. Harris hit 41 percent of those field goal attempts, which slotted him in the 70th percentile among wings, per CleaningTheGlass.com.

Denver’s core three are dynamic at scoring the ball and were the main reason why the Nuggets were a top-six offense for a second-consecutive season. Denver needs all three to be better on defense next year.

Superstars can become available at the drop of a hat, but odds are that the trio, who were all drafted by Connelly and developed by the current staff, will be in Nuggets jerseys for the foreseeable future. All three want to stay in Denver too.

“I finally can say with full confidence that we have a core that can be really good for a long time,” Connelly said.

The next step for the Nuggets and their core is the playoffs. After a season where the front office, coaching staff and players remained in lockstep with one another that they never had a “playoffs or bust mentality,” postseason basketball is the expectation next year.

“I think we’re there. How many times are you going to be the bridesmaid?” Connelly asked. “Our young core, three of our best players are 23, 22 and 21 and they’ve proven they’re capable of doing it at the highest level. I think all of us are quite frankly are sick of this time of year having a press conference.”

Denver showed this season that it arguably has the best young core in the league. But Jokic, Murray, Harris and the Nuggets’ front office know that distinction means nothing without a playoff appearance.

“It will be fun next year. We’ll be good,” Murray said while thinking about running it back next year with the same core group plus an able-bodied Paul Millsap. “Once we have everybody healthy and we’re playing at a high level, we’re really hard to stop.”