DENVER — — Michael Malone didn’t need to worry about his superstar center and potential disappointment when the Denver Nuggets faced the short-handed Utah Jazz.
Nikola Jokic played through a bruised right arm that prevented him from shooting and Jamal Murray scored 37 points, helping the Nuggets destroy the Jazz 142-121 on Saturday night.
Jokic had 26 points, six rebounds and eight assists, and Michael Porter Jr. added 19 points for Denver, which moved to within a half-game of leading Western Conferene leading Oklahoma City, which was idle Saturday night.
The Nuggets, coming off a big win over Boston, led by 39 points in the first half, which helped them hold off Utah’s third-quarter rally that cut the deficit to 14.
The Jazz scored as many points during this third quarter as in the first half.
Trailing 78-44 at the break, the Jazz dominated Denver 44-24. Keyonte George led Utah with 29 points and fueled the Jazz’s third-quarter surge that made it more respectable and had the sold-out crowd buzzing about a potential historic collapse.
“It was embarrassing,” Malone said.
But he was pleased with the other three quarters of play.
“I was really proud of our approach to start the game,” Malone said. “Building a 39-point lead was exceptional. Unfortunately, at the end of the half we didn’t do anything like what we did in the first half to take that lead.
The Nuggets made 14 of 20 shots from long range before halftime and finished 19 of 32 from beyond the arc, including Murray’s 6 of 9.
“I give the Nuggets a lot of credit,” Jazz coach Will Hardy said. “I mean, 14 of 20 from three in the first half, that’s pretty spectacular. And this is a championship level team and when a team shoots the ball from the perimeter like that, it’s a tough game to win.
With Murray leading the second unit in the fourth quarter, the Nuggets recalibrated and reached their eighth in nine games since the All-Star break.
The Nuggets were coming off a 115-109 victory over the Celtics on Thursday night that gave them a season sweep of the Eastern Conference leaders, so Malone feared his team was in for an emotional letdown.
“It’s easy to join the best team in the NBA,” Malone said an hour before kickoff. “And Boston is a sexy game.”
This is not the case with this one.
“Tonight is different. You’re playing a team that’s 5½ games out of play-in and without Lauri Markkanen (bruised right thigh), they don’t have any All-Stars,” Malone said. “They’re playing a lot of guys that our players probably have I don’t even know – They don’t know who Brice Sensabaugh is.
So, Malone said he would continue to hammer home the point that the reason the defending NBA champions are rolling is because “we don’t care who we play; we wanted to play up to our standards.
They did it Saturday night, at least for three quarters.
“In every game we’ve played, I feel like there’s a time where we haven’t played well,” said Murray, who made six 3-pointers in nine tries. “So I don’t feel like it’s any different today. We led by how much from the start? So I feel like we did a really good job the whole game.
“It was just the quarter where they played harder than us. And we came back and closed out the game. So we did a good job of staying in that momentum, getting our energy back and not letting their run affect us.
FOLLOWING
Jazz: Host Boston Tuesday night.
Nuggets: Host Toronto Monday night.
——
APNBA:
