OAKLAND, Calif. — For a 19-year-old NBA rookie, every game is a lesson.
For Emmanuel Mudiay, the Nuggets’ teen point guard, Friday night represented a graduate-level seminar with instructor Stephen Curry of the Golden State Warriors.
Curry, the reigning league MVP, came into Friday leading the NBA in scoring at 35.8 points per game, shooting 57.4 percent from the floor and an astonishing 51.9 percent on 3-point attempts.
Mudiay, meanwhile, has had an up-and-down introduction to the league, shooting 30.2 percent through his first five games with 29 assists against 28 turnovers.
Nuggets coach Mike Malone said Mudiay has landed in trouble by being overly eager to make something happen offensively for a Denver team that ranked 24th in scoring as of Friday, at 96.0 points per game.
“He gets himself into that paint, trying to be aggressive, and then will leave his feet sometimes not really sure — ‘Am I passing? Am I shooting?’ ” Malone said. “He’s a rookie, a 19-year-old rookie, playing in the Western Conference, and there’ll be plenty of growing pains this year. But as long as we’re learning from those mistakes, getting better, and not repeating the same ones over and over, then progress will be made. … By the end of the year, I think we’ll see a much different player than we see right now.”
Lauvergne to return?
Malone said he’s hoping dinged-up center Joffrey Lauvergne (low back strain), who won the starting spot in place of injured Jusuf Nurkic (left patellar tendon repair) during preseason, will be available next week when the Nuggets return for three games at the Pepsi Center, beginning Monday against Portland.
Along with Nurkic and forward Wilson Chandler (right hip strain), “I think Joffrey is the closest out of the three (to returning),” Malone said. “When we come back for our homestand, hopefully we’ll be able to have Joffrey back in our lineup.” Geoff Lepper, Special to The Denver Post
