LOS ANGELES — The Denver Nuggets are advancing to the NBA Finals for the first time in franchise history after capturing a four-game win over the Los Angeles Lakers with a 113-111 win in Monday’s Western Conference Finals.
The Nuggets stifled the Lakers’ dying breaths, which had kept their season alive for weeks after it was deemed over. “I thought we fought as hard as we could,” said Lakers coach Darvin Ham.
Now Denver awaits the winner of the Eastern Conference Finals, in which the Miami Heat have a 3-0 lead over the Boston Celtics. Game 4 in the East takes place in Miami on Tuesday.
For the Nuggets, Monday’s win was the culmination of a year-long process as their regulars grew together, weathered serious injuries and questioned their ability to even compete in the West. Their top player, center Nikola Jokic, twice won the league’s Most Valuable Player award but only managed to reach the conference finals once.
Jokic was named Western Conference Finals MVP.
Denver lost star guard Jamal Murray in April 2021 when he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee. Nuggets coach Michael Malone said Murray tearfully asked if the Nuggets would trade him the day after the injury, calling himself “damaged merchandise”.
“I hugged him,” Malone said. “I said, ‘Damn no, you’re ours.’ We love you. We will help you come back and you will be a better player in return.’”
Murray missed the rest of that season and all of 2021–22. In this year’s playoffs, Denver’s patience paid off.
Murray looked like the player he was before the injury and Jokic continued to play at the elite level, perfectly complemented by Denver’s talented role players.
The Nuggets rose to first place in the West in December and never fell off the top spot. In the playoffs, they defeated the Timberwolves 4-1 in the first round and the Phoenix Suns 4-2 in the second round. Even though Denver dominated all season, the odds makers didn’t think they would win the championship. The nuggets have embraced that.
“We’re the underdogs,” said guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. “We don’t get enough credit for what we do.” He continued, “Since it’s not talked about much, we take it personally. We just use that energy to continue proving everyone wrong.”
Even after the first two rounds, some thought the Lakers were dangerous enough to be the team to finally defeat the Nuggets.
That confidence in the Lakers had only developed during the playoffs.
For a time, the Lakers seemed doomed due to roster issues and injuries to their stars LeBron James and Anthony Davis.
They started the season with a 2-10 record. In December, as the Nuggets cemented their place at the top of the West, the Lakers were in 13th place.
Guard Russell Westbrook, who struggled with the Lakers last season, still didn’t fit in and was dropped from the starting lineup after three games. Davis injured his foot against the Nuggets on December 16 and missed 20 games while recovering. Shortly after Davis returned, James missed several games due to a foot injury that some doctors he consulted said required surgery.
But changes to the February close helped. The Lakers sent out Westbrook and brought in role players – Jarred Vanderbilt, D’Angelo Russell and Malik Beasley. They had also traded for Rui Hachimura in January.
At the end of the regular season, they moved up to seventh place in the West and defeated Minnesota in overtime play-in tournament to earn seventh place in the playoffs. In the first round, they calmed down a cocky Memphis team that had spent most of the season in the top three in the West, defeating them 4-2. They then defeated the defending champions, the Golden State Warriors, 4-2, dominating them in the deciding game of the second round.
But the Nuggets proved to be a different type of opponent. They were more cohesive, less dramatic, and stronger in the center than Memphis and Golden State.
In the Lakers’ first two series, they were verbally attacked by their opponents, whether it was Grizzlies guard Dillon Brooks calling out 38-year-old James or the Warriors accusing them of flopping on cheap calls. The Nuggets took a different approach, showing respect for the pitch to the end.
“I’m not going to say I’m scared, but I’m worried,” Jokic said after Denver’s Game 3 win. “Because they have LeBron on the other side and he’s capable of anything.”
James seemed more fallible in this series than in the past. He went 0-10 from 3-point range in the first two games, made costly mistakes late in Game 1, and drew ridicule for missing a dunk in Game 2. He had previously dragged the team through Davis’ postseason inconsistency, but the Nuggets managed not to let him do that again.
Comments are closed.