LOS ANGELES — Pinch yourself, Nuggets Nation. The dream is real. For the first time in their NBA history, the Nuggets are on the doorstep of the Finals.
Knock politely? No way. No how.
After rocking the L.A. Lakers 119-108 on Saturday night, the Nuggets are ready to kick down that freakin’ door.
“I’ve never looked at the history of the Nuggets as a weight or a burden. I’ve looked at it as an opportunity to be the first team to win a championship,” coach Michael Malone told me as we stood outside the Denver locker room after the victory.
Eddie Murphy was here at Crypto.com Arena, with his feet on the floor near midcourt, wearing sunglasses. Indoors. At night. In a building drenched in Hollywood glitz, Jake Gyllenhaal turned the head of every lady in the house. And, at 86 years old, Jack Nicholson is still so cool he doesn’t even feel the need to comb his hair.
So many stars.
But on this spring night in SoCal, Nuggets guard Jamal Murray outshined them all.
Murray scored 37 points. And every shot by the Blue Arrow drove home a point straight through the doubt surrounding Denver as a legit championship contender. To the shock and dismay of the crowd in L.A., the Nuggets put Game 3 away with a 13-0 run in the fourth quarter.
With a commanding 3-0 lead in this best-of-seven series, Nikola Jokic and Murray are simply better at basketball than LeBron James and Anthony Davis.
As Denver raced to a 14-point lead in the first quarter, threatening to run the Lakers out of their own building and down Santa Monica Boulevard in the backseat of Randy Newman’s convertible, two questions leapt to mind:
Bubble Murray is old news; when did the Blue Arrow morph into Air Jordan?
And: How did these Lakers even make the playoffs?
But if winning the first championship in franchise history was as easy as the early stages of this game looked, the Nuggets would’ve done it by now. The Lakers climbed back in the game on the competitive grit of James, Davis’ re-emergence from his Game 2 slumber and the sharp-shooting of Austin Reaves.
While 30 points by Murray in the opening 24 minutes were dazzling, three personal fouls on Jokic were disturbing as the Nuggets held a slim 58-55 lead going into halftime.
And when Jokic picked up his fourth foul not five minutes deep into the third quarter, Malone challenged the call. No dice. As the two-time MVP took a seat on the Denver bench L.A. fans jumped out of their seats. The Nuggets appeared to be in deep soup. A 3-pointer by Reaves tied it at 71 with 5:25 remaining in the third quarter.
The measure of this team’s mettle and maturity, however, is how the Nuggets don’t flinch, much less panic, in the face of adversity. With Murray, scoreless in the third period, suddenly silent, and Jokic doing nothing more than offering encouragement from the sideline, Denver somehow managed to take an 84-82 advantage into the final 12 minutes.
“I never doubted my team,” said Jokic, who made his voice heard in the huddle and his presence felt on the court in the fourth quarter, proving that even foul trouble can’t keep the real MVP down. Here’s hoping Philadelphia center Joel Embiid got a chance to watch from home, enjoying every one of Jokic’s 24 points, six rebounds and eight assists.
Los Angeles and Boston are the storied franchises with all the tradition and too many championship banners in the rafters to count (OK, it’s 34 between them; I looked it up.)
James and Davis, however, ain’t what they use to be. Jokic and Murray are ascending stars.
Well, well, well. The tinfoil-hat conspiracy theorists are going to hate this. Even refs who blew a very sympathetic tune for the stars couldn’t save L.A. from being pushed to the brink of a sweep. In the conference finals, the Lakers and Celtics are on the ropes.
Coming off the floor after handing the Lakers their first home loss in these playoffs, Murray told his teammates not to get too giddy.
“It takes 16 wins to win a championship,” Murray explained. “And we’ve got five more to go.”
The Nuggets are ready for their close-up. I’m not so certain television network executives are thrilled about a team from the lost time zone knocking LeBron and the Lakers out of the national spotlight.
If Denver takes its quest for the first championship in franchise history to South Beach to play the Miami Heat, will the NBA Finals be telecast on ESPN the Ocho?
Want more sports news? Sign up for the Sports Omelette to get all our analysis on Denver’s teams.
