Michael Malone is a coach that has been known to make some tough decisions with his short tenure with the Denver Nuggets, especially regarding the point guard position. It doesn’t matter if its looked at as the unpopular decision, he’s going to make it and stick by that decision. In Friday night’s thrilling 95-94 victory against the visiting Miami Heat on the first night of a back-to-back that closes with Golden State Warriors, the Nuggets head coach made yet another tough decision.
Prior to Friday night’s game Jamal Murray was on a three games consecutive streak of scoring 20 points or more and was just coming off of a game in which he recorded 24 points going an efficient 8-of-10 from the field, but on Friday, that streak came to an end.
Murray managed to only played 21 minutes going a pedestrian 1-of-6 from the field (1-of-3 from beyond the arc) to finish with only 3 points on the night. Michael Malone elected to not play the starter for the entire 4th quarter.
Coach Malone instead chose to go with his bench unit for back court duties.
“Jamal Murray struggled but I think Emmanuel really gave good minutes.”
While Emmanuel Mudiay’s numbers don’t wow you, he did finish with a plus/minus of 3. The backup point guard had 12 points, 4 assist, 3 rebounds and a key block that led to a fast-break basket while the Nuggets were in the midst of a game changing run. But it wasn’t the starter, wasn’t the back-up point guard who Michael Malone decided to finish the game with.
“We closed the game with Will Barton playing as our point guard” said Michael Malone to media following the game. “He (Barton) might’ve set the most important screen of the night to get Paul Millsap open on that side out of bounds and he gave us some good minutes.”
It was the first time the Nuggets head coach has decided to go with Barton at point guard to close out the game and it proved to be the right decision given the outcome. Michael Malone seems to be believe it was one of the things that led to a victory.
“These are the games we would’ve lost last year, point blank.”