The Denver Nuggets Love Playing Game 7's
Wow! What a great win for the Denver Nuggets. They just played what felt like their millionth game 7 since last year’s NBA playoffs. I saw several sports analysts believe that the Los Angeles Clippers would win this game. I didn’t feel that way after the Clippers lost their first shot at sending the Denver Nuggets home in game 5 losing by six points. The final score was 111–106.
Okay, the Clippers blew a game. No biggie. They’ll just crush the Nuggets in game 6 right? So we thought. The Nuggets would end up being down huge in that game. Somehow they were able to make a huge comeback to win game 6 with the final score being 111–98! That’s incredible. To stave off elimination in a big fashion even with Kawhi Leonard and Paul George playing well is a great achievement.
Nikola Jokic had another great game along with Jamal Murray. This is when I felt like the Clippers had lost control of this series. The Nuggets now had all the momentum into this series. The Clippers have yet to look like the superteam that they’re supposed to be. The Nuggets, on the other hand, look like a team that flows really well together since their game 4 96–85 loss.
And now the great game 7. Denver looks like it would pull away early until the LA Clippers starting playing with some flare. The Clippers would begin to build a sizeable lead at the end of the first and second quarters. At this point, it looked like the Clippers would blow the Nuggets out until Jamal Murray would find his groove to help them cut the deficit to two points.
The Repeat
Once again, the Nuggets make a comeback to give themselves a chance to win the game and the semifinals. The third quarter begins. The Clippers score just enough to keep a small lead on the Nuggets. Afterward, the storm that would fall on the Clippers would change everything. The Denver Nuggets would go on a monster run to take complete control of the game.
Various Nuggets’ players would contribute to this insane run. Veteran player Paul Millsap would hit some big three’s. Jerami Grant would hit some clutch three’s also that would give them the 62–61 lead in the third quarter. Garry Harris and Jamal Murray would join the party to make Denver’s lead grow with each possession.
Out Of Gas
Meanwhile, other than Paul George and Montrezl Harrell at times, the Clippers looked cooked. One of George’s shots was so bad, the rim itself rejected it and said ‘’I’m not accepting this shot’’. I kept thinking they would make a run eventually to give themselves a final chance in the fourth quarter, but the run never came. Honestly, Denver’s star player Nikola Jokic didn’t need to come back in the game because his fellow co-star Jamal Murray was brilliant down the stretch.
With two minutes to go in the game, Jokic throws a nice pass to Jerami Grant for a dunk. It’s with this play, that you can tell that this series was over. The final score would be 104–89. The Denver Nuggets now advance to the NBA Conference Finals for the first time since 2009 to play the Los Angeles Lakers. The Lakers will be a tough challenge for the Nuggets. Who knows? This Nuggets team may have a few more tricks up their sleeve.
They have a really good coach in Mike Malone. Credit to the Nuggets for coming back from yet another 3–1 deficient in a series. This team really loves going all the way to game 7’s. For the Clippers, this is a huge disappointment for a team that wanted to win it all this year. Kawhi Leonard and Paul George didn’t show up the way we all expect them to.
Kawhi in particular shocked me tonight. The man is human after all. Lou Williams was off on his game also. The whole team never really gelled since the season started. Twitter (especially Laker fans) is probably going in on the Clippers for bowing out so soon. We’ll see what happens with their team. With Doc Rivers return as their coach? So many questions.
With the Nuggets and fans, it’s their night. Enjoy it! Y’all have an amazing team that evolving right before our eyes. Maybe the next series they’ll finish it in six? It should be a great one to watch.
