The Denver Nuggets lost 102-100 to the Los Angeles Clippers on Thursday night in heartbreaking fashion.

The Nuggets had a shot to win it at the end. Unfortunately, bad execution after forcing a Clippers miss with seven seconds left in the game. Peyton Watson collected a rebound an immediately dribbled before the Nuggets had a chance to call timeout, meaning Denver had to inbound the ball from the backcourt with just over four seconds remaining. Nikola Jokic had an opportunity to win it at the end, but it was a poor shot attempt, reminiscent of Jokic’s buzzer beater against the Golden State Warriors. This time, he caught all backboard and iron.

Jokic dominated with 36 points, 17 rebounds, and 10 assists in his 40 minutes, shooting an efficient percentage and making clutch plays down the stretch. The Nuggets were +12 in his minutes and looked to be in control of this game from the very beginning, and it was primarily due to Jokic that the Nuggets even had a chance at the end.

 Unfortunately, the Nuggets lost by two, which means in the eight minutes Jokic didn’t play, the team lost those minutes by 14 points. The primary issue was the beginning of the second quarter, when a lineup featuring Reggie Jackson, Justin Holiday, Michael Porter Jr., Peyton Watson, and DeAndre Jordan couldn’t score at all, nor could it defend. The Clippers recaptured the lead and the momentum before Jokic returned to the floor, and the Nuggets had a perpetual deficit of five to 10 points for the majority of the game after that.

Jackson and Porter in particular struggled. Jackson played just 22 minutes, shooting 2-of-6 from the field and scoring seven points. He had some good possessions with Jokic early on, but removing those and looking at the other minutes, it was pretty poor on both ends of the floor. The Jackson-Jordan combination was heralded as a pick and roll option the Nuggets could go to in a pinch, and they had previously done so in the same building against the same Clippers back in November. Unfortunately, it didn’t come to pass.

Porter, on the other hand, simply missed shots and was attacked defensively. He had plenty of opportunities to affect the outcome of the game as a shooter and spacer, but tonight was a rare horrible shooting night from Porter. He shot 6-of-18 from the field and 2-of-10 from three. 12 missed shots is actually the most Porter has missed all season, which shows his consistency more than anything else. Tonight was an outlier, and an unfortunately timed outlier at that. The Nuggets needed one more thing to go right for them, and it just didn’t happen.

 On one of Porter’s three-point misses, Ivica Zubac moved into Porter’s landing space and should have been called for a shooting foul, perhaps even a flagrant foul. Michael Malone was irate and made a point to be ejected from the game, receiving two technical fouls. The Clippers made both, and Denver ended up losing by two points. That’s a tough circumstance to pin on Malone, and he had a right to be upset and go after the official. The unfortunate reality was that Denver needed every point to come back.

Aaron Gordon and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope had strong defensive games. Their primary matchups, Paul George and James Harden, shot 10-of-21 and 6-of-23 respectively. The Nuggets also clamped down when it mattered and got themselves back into the game with strong defensive possessions.

Gordon was also a bully on the interior and got to the free throw line 14 times. He made just eight free throws though, missing six that could have helped change the game. On one of Denver’s final offensive possessions, Gordon attacked open space in transition and got into the paint before slipping. Caldwell-Pope also missed a technical free throw in the clutch, something that would have changed Denver’s strategy greatly in the final minute.

Overall, this was a game when the Nuggets clearly missed Jamal Murray. Not having a playmaker to attack in the non-Jokic minutes and run consistent stuff in the clutch was an issue. Murray’s been great in this matchup before and would have attacked Harden in pick and roll with regularity. The Nuggets needed that as a go-to, but Murray missed his seventh straight game. It’s possible that Murray will be back on Saturday at home against the Atlanta Hawks.

A tough loss for the Nuggets that effectively takes them back out of the race for the top spot in the West. The Nuggets have to win their final five games of the year if they want to set a franchise record for wins as well, though that’s clearly an afterthought at this stage of the season. The Nuggets need to get healthy. They need to get their bench units right, and they must play at least one playoff tune-up game before the season is over, one that includes a healthy rotation.

We will see when that happens.

Final Rotations