The Denver Nuggets just pulled off one of the wildest victories of the NBA season, capping a 25-4 run over the game's final six-plus minutes with a 39-foot, banked-in buzzer-beater from Nikola Jokic to stun the host Golden State Warriors, 130-127, on Thursday.
Seriously, look at this shot from Jokic:
Stan Van Gundy took the words out of everyone's mouth: "Are you kidding me?" A 7-footer pulling up off the dribble from outside the logo at the buzzer? Bank or no bank, Jokic is something else. I mean, the dude has missed only five shots over his last four games. And, yes, you read that right. After going 13 for 16 for 34 points on Thursday, Jokic has now made 39 of his last 44 shots.
So this is great for the reigning champion Nuggets, who are kind of coasting along waiting for the postseason, if we're being honest. But on the other side of a victory like this there is always a team bleeding out, and for the Warriors, this is without question the toughest loss in a season that has been filled with close-but-no-cigar losses.
So far Golden State has played in a league-high 27 clutch games, which are defined as games being within five points with five minutes or fewer to play. They are 13-14 in those games. Treading water.
This is the kind of loss that can put you under.
"These games all come down to the wire it feels like for us this year," Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said. "These are gut punches, for sure."
With the loss, the Warriors, for the time being, fall out of a Play-In Tournament spot at 16-18, a half-game back of the also-reeling Lakers for the No. 10 seed. The Warriors are not even close to as good as the Nuggets, but on any given night, they can still play with anyone in the league. They just don't have any margin for error anymore. They can't turn the ball over, particularly at the wrong time. They can't go cold when it's time to close.
They did both on Thursday. Stephen Curry missed all five of his shots over the final six minutes and threw away the pass that gave the Nuggets their final, game-winning possession. Chris Paul, Klay Thompson and Andrew Wiggins all missed crucial jumpers. And on the other end, the Warriors couldn't get stops.
Call the Jokic winner a bad roll of the dice, but the game was going the wrong way long before that, and the Warriors paid the price for letting a championship team hang around a little too long.
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