David Adelman saved a challenge for the end, and it saved the Nuggets from a disastrous loss.
Keyonte George was going to the foul line with 16 seconds left and a chance to give Utah the lead Monday night. If he made both, Denver was going to have to score without Nikola Jokic. He had just fouled out trying to stop George at the rim.
Turns out, he hadn’t. Denver challenged the call successfully, and the result was a game-winning clean block for Jokic. The Nuggets snapped a two-game skid with an ugly 128-125 win over the Jazz, moving back within a half-game of fourth-place Minnesota in the West standings.
March Madness
“I will explore,” David Adelman vowed after losing to the Timberwolves on Sunday. He was talking about Jokic’s rest stints, but the experimentation went far beyond that 24 hours later.
The situation in Utah was especially conducive to unorthodox lineups, as Adelman was game-planning without his top four forwards. Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson remained out with hamstring strains. Cam Johnson (ankle) and Spencer Jones (shoulder) also stayed home from the one-game trip. Adelman was ready to get weird.
For the first time this season, he started a game with a double-big lineup. Spacing was awkward early with Nikola Jokic and Jonas Valanciunas trying to get set up properly. Utah crowded the paint, and Denver committed three turnovers in the first four minutes. After Valanciunas checked out, he didn’t play the rest of the first half. But the two centers grew into the game well. They were more effective together for a few minutes to start the second half especially, turning a 67-66 deficit into a brief 81-74 lead. Valanciunas went for 13 points and six rebounds in 17 minutes.
What did it all mean for the non-Jokic minutes? Adelman went to the opposite end of the spectrum in the second quarter, playing Zeke Nnaji at the five along with four guards. The closest thing to a power forward was probably Bruce Brown, who’s been assuming dunker spot responsibilities more often during Gordon’s absence.
The second-half rotation got shaken up when Jokic committed his fourth foul and checked out with 3:56 left in the third. He had to take another two-minute breather in the final frame after picking up his fifth foul. Among the other oddities in the rotation: Julian Strawther started but was subbed out two minutes into the game for Tim Hardaway Jr.
Murray to the rescue
Jamal Murray quietly went into a bit of a slump in February, shooting 44% from the field and 34% from 3-point range for the month. He snapped out of it in Salt Lake City, where the Nuggets desperately needed a hero.
Murray made a collection of leaning, pivoting and side-stepping 3s during an 8-for-13 performance from deep. He scored 18 of his 45 points in the third quarter as Denver pushed its lead to 100-93. When the game entered clutch time — the two most dreaded words for Nuggets fans lately — Murray was the offense. Down 125-122 with 90 seconds to go, Denver went to flat spacing along the baseline and allowed Murray to dance in isolation for a tough midrange jumper.
He drew a shooting foul from the midrange on the next possession, earning a pair of free throws to give Denver the lead for good with 32 seconds left. It was Murray’s 17th 30-point performance of the season. The Nuggets improved to 10-0 in his regular-season career when he scores 40 or more, including 4-0 this season.
Jokic fighs his own battles
Three minutes into the game, Jokic was visibly frustrated as George fronted him in the post, hooked the big man’s legs from behind and backed up into his space. While the ball was on the other side of the court, Jokic tumbled over the top of George, giving him a piggy-back ride.
For a team that’s trying to lose for draft positioning lately, the Jazz deployed an unexpectedly competitive game plan. It was straight out of the “frustrate Jokic” playbook — guard him with smaller players, put up to three bodies on him, deny him the ball by fronting him, grabbing him and pushing him off his spots. Jokic became wrapped up in how it was officiated throughout the night, letting Utah’s aggressiveness get to him at times instead of playing through it and imposing his own physicality.
The irony of his frustration in the end was the free-throw discrepancy in the fourth quarter. The Nuggets attempted 21. The Jazz attempted three.
The irony of his game-saving block was that he was particularly inadequate defensively throughout the night. Utah played a lot of 1-on-1 offense, and George got wherever he wanted on the floor en route to 36 points. The Jazz scored 50 in the paint.
