When Dallas attempted to isolate Michael Porter Jr. against Luka Doncic, Porter Jr. performed excellent one-on-one defense.
Attending the in-season tournament dressed in Golden State colors, the Nuggets looked like a Steph Curry Warriors club.
In the opening group stage game of the NBA’s first-ever full-league tournament, Denver defeated the previously unbeaten Mavericks 125-114 on Friday night. Denver scored their first five 3-point tries and shot 12-for-24 through three quarters.
In addition to reaching 4,000 career assists and scoring 33 points on 14 of 16 shots, Nikola Jokic was only one assist short of joining LeBron James and Jason Kidd as the all-time leaders in assists. With an average point differential of plus-10.2, the Nuggets are 45-5 in the previous 50 games he has played at Ball Arena.
The Mavericks (4-1) are among the five fortunate teams to have won away from Denver during that time. They have had an incredible season thus far, particularly when it comes to their performance beyond the arc, where they were shooting 41% prior to Friday night’s game. As such, they appear to be a strong contender to repeat as spoilers at altitude. especially with Kyrie Irving back in the starting lineup after missing the previous two games and Luka Doncic averaging almost a triple-double of 30 points per game.
Even though Dallas pursued Doncic in isolation offense in an attempt to find the All-NBA point guard, Michael Porter Jr. played a commendable guarding job, finishing with 24 points and nine rebounds. Doncic concluded with 24 shots and 34 well-earned points. Porter defended himself by walling up and avoiding repeated blows. Irving extended the Mavericks’ lead to 22.
The Nuggets (5-1) dominated in the paint and scored 20 second-chance points, including a Porter put-back with 3:04 remaining to restore a 10-point lead. They were forced to make a comeback for the first game this season after struggling to produce offense Wednesday in Minnesota. They made it through an incredible first quarter, during which they appeared unsteady for a mere sixty seconds.
Denver gave up transition baskets and turned the ball over on its first two possessions. Then everything was OK. Denver led 40–24 at the end of the first quarter after going 14–20 from the field and 6–7 from 3-point range. None of the nine rotation players who scored during the quarter had a double-double.
Though Michael Malone’s second unit continued to produce encouraging flashes, the second’s offensive performance was less assured. Zeke Nnaji’s impact was still subtle but effective; on Denver’s opening possession of the quarter, Nnaji and Murray executed a pick-and-roll, which Nnaji converted into a basket and a foul. In eleven minutes, he pulled down four rebounds. Jokic’s buzzer-beater three-pointer and his cry toward the blue-and-yellow floor came after the Nuggets had already pulled off a feat they did 14 times in 2022–23, which was scoring 70 points in the first half.
The percentage of games—home games particularly—in which rivals appear closer than they actually are is a trend that looks certain to continue this year. With 10:16 left in the fourth quarter, a lead as big as 20 points dropped to just one, forcing Malone to call a timeout during the second stretch of non-Jokic minutes on Friday. However, Jokic checked back in after two minutes, and the score never went any closer than three possessions.
On Saturday at 7 p.m., the Nuggets will play the Bulls to finish their second back-to-back of the year. They play the Clippers in Denver on November 14 in their next in-season tournament match.