Current location:Earthly Edition news portal > world
Nuggets have a banner night
Earthly Edition news portal2024-05-21 14:29:12【world】4People have gathered around
IntroductionDenver Nuggets players, including Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, and head coach Michael Malone look
Denver Nuggets players, including Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, and head coach Michael Malone look on as their NBA championship banner is raised before the game against the Los Angeles Lakers at Ball Arena in Denver, Colorado, on Tuesday. Getty Images via AFP
Champions pick up where they left off to sink Lakers in season-opener
DENVER — The bling and the banner were nice. What the Denver Nuggets really relished, though, was opening the defense of the franchise's first NBA title with a 119-107 win over the Los Angeles Lakers on Tuesday night.
"We can't think about last year too much," Jamal Murray said after the Nuggets followed the raising of their championship banner by dropping the hammer on the Lakers in the NBA's season-opener, which featured Nikola Jokic's triple-double and LeBron James taking a few more breathers than normal.
Jokic said the Nuggets fed off the emotion from the pregame ceremony to jump out to an early 18-point lead, which held up even after the Lakers got within three points in the fourth quarter.
"I think we controlled the game the whole time," said Jokic, who had 29 points, 13 rebounds and 11 assists.
Murray added 21 points, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope scored 20, Aaron Gordon had 15 and Michael Porter Jr. had 12.
All of LA's starters also scored in double figures, led by James' 21 points in 29 minutes — his playing time is being monitored at the start of his 21st season.
"It helps," Murray said with a smile.
James ended up playing about five fewer minutes than he's used to.
"I mean, I always want to be on the floor," James said, "especially when you got an opportunity to win a game or feel like you can make an impact. But I guess there's a system in place and I'll follow it."
James, the league's oldest player at age 38, stressed, "I'm not surprised or upset" about the Lakers monitoring his minutes as the season gets going.
Taurean Prince scored 18 points in his debut for the Lakers, his fifth team in nine seasons. Anthony Davis had 17 points, Austin Reaves 14 and D'Angelo Russell 11.
The Lakers trailed by 18 early but trimmed that deficit to 63-54 at halftime and used a 13-0 run spanning the third and fourth quarters to pull within 87-84 before Aaron Gordon stopped the run with a 3-pointer.
The Lakers never got closer.
After James' basket got Los Angeles within 103-96 with just over five minutes remaining, the Nuggets called timeout and came out of it with a 10-3 run featuring 3-pointers by Murray and Porter to put the Lakers away.
"We were trending in the right direction for a while there," Lakers coach Darvin Ham said. "Each quarter we had given up less and less and then they just kind of blew the game open."
The Nuggets received their gold, diamond-encrusted championship rings — featuring a mini championship banner that rolls out from one side — in a pregame ceremony. Murray, wearing a microphone, told teammate Gordon, "I might play the first quarter with it!"
Nuggets coach Michael Malone relished one last hurrah over last season's breakthrough before turning his attention entirely to this season.
"Jason of Beverly Hills, I want to thank them for some really nice hardware. And then at that point, I was like, 'Let's get the game going,'" Malone said of watching the banner rise to the rafters at a sold-out, shaking Ball Arena.
"And I was also thinking about my father, just wish he was here."
Brendan Malone, the longtime coach and driving force behind the Detroit Pistons' "Bad Boys" defenses in the late 1980s and early '90s, died earlier this month at age 81.
"So, a lot of emotions tonight but all really positive," Malone said, "and to end it with a win is a great way to start the season off."
The Nuggets went 16-4 in the playoffs — including a sweep of the Lakers in the Western Conference Finals — and finished things off by closing out Miami in five games to start a summer of celebrations from Denver's delirious downtown to Jokic's hometown of Sombor, Serbia.
Jokic snubbed
Jokic may have followed up back-to-back MVP seasons by leading the Nuggets to their first NBA title, but TNT left him off its graphic promoting its opening-night doubleheader — the Lakers-Nuggets and Suns-Warriors games.
The graphic featured James, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant and Jayson Tatum — the last an odd choice given that the Celtics don't play until Wednesday night. The snub upset Charles Barkley, the co-host of TNT's Inside the NBA, who apologized to the Nuggets and their fans for the omission.
That said, Barkley opined in a pregame interview that he thinks the Nuggets will have a tough time repeating.
"I think they're in the mix. I'm a big Bruce Brown fan," Barkley said of the starting small forward who signed a two-year, $45 million contract with the Indiana Pacers following Denver's title run. "They gotta replace him and the young guys gotta come on, and they're going to have to adjust to being the hunted."
Address of this article:http://janmayen.brittasbay.org/html-91c199832.html
Very good!(576)
Related articles
- Britain's new bonkers EV: Callum Skye is an £80k electric buggy built in Warwickshire
- Former senior Chongqing municipal legislator indicted for bribery
- China issues rules on human organ donation, transplantation
- News organizations urge Biden and Trump to commit to presidential debates during the 2024 campaign
- Young Boys seals 6th Swiss soccer league title in 7 years after rallying from firing coach Wicky
- Chinese cities mobilize new technologies to spur improved development
- Procuratorate orders arrest of former vice president of China Development Bank
- McCormick gets Trump's endorsement in Pennsylvania's Senate race despite awkward history
- Philippines blames China for loss of giant clams in disputed shoal and urges environmental inquiry
- China issues yellow alert for blizzards
Popular articles
- Medics remove 150 MAGGOTS from a woman's mouth after dental procedure left her with rotting tissue
- Xinjiang braces for more passenger train suspensions amid extreme weather
- China to further enhance medical treatment for critical pregnant women
- City in E China's Anhui transforms abandoned mining site into thriving tent hotel
Recommended
Red Lobster seeks bankruptcy protection after closing some restaurants
The foreign hairdresser who calls himself a Xinjianger
Procuratorate orders arrest of former vice president of China Development Bank
China's education ministry outlines major tasks for year 2024
A warrant for Netanyahu’s arrest was requested. But no decision was made about whether to issue it
China trains high
Liverpool loses 1
Mainland slams DPP's de
Links
- Wisconsin woman who argued she legally killed sex trafficker pleads guilty to homicide
- From Jabba the Hutt and Teletubby Hill to Drinking Dinosaur and the Wedding Cake
- Scammer who claimed to be an Irish heiress should be extradited to UK, judge rules
- South Sudan mediation talks launched in Kenya with a hope of ending conflict
- Kate Hudson performs music on the Howard Stern show as she cites Madonna as her hero
- Jenna Dewan bares her bump in completely nude snap
- Travis Kelce responds to Jana Kramer's claims he's a bad influence on girlfriend Taylor Swift
- Poland lifts immunity of a judge who defected to Belarus, paving way for an arrest warrant
- New York appeals court rules ethics watchdog that pursued Cuomo was created unconstitutionally
- ASU scholar on leave after confrontation with woman at pro