HOUSTON — The Nuggets’ grueling five-game road trip, and their in-season tournament hopes and dreams, spiraled toward a crash landing Friday night at Toyota Center.

After Nikola Jokic scored the first five points of the game, a 13-0 Rockets run snowballed into a 26-point Denver deficit and eventually a 105-86 loss, but not before the Nuggets made the Rockets nervous. Led by 38 points, 19 rebounds and eight assists from Jokic, the gap narrowed to single digits with nine minutes remaining but never got any closer than nine points.

The Nuggets’ second loss in Houston this month concluded a 1-4 road trip in which their only win came against a Detroit team that had dropped 11 in a row. Next is a desperately needed matchup with the struggling Spurs on Sunday at Ball Arena, where no visiting team has won this season.

The Nuggets (10-6) started 2-0 in the first-ever in-season event and finished 2-2 in the group round. Houston’s drive to extend the lead to 19 points in the closing minutes of the game eliminated them. Every West B team could finish 2-2 in a five-way tie, depending on the outcome of New Orleans vs. Los Angeles late Friday. Denver’s minus-10 point differential would not be mathematically possible even in that case, which would need the Clippers to defeat the Pelicans and the Mavericks to defeat the Rockets on Tuesday.

Houston’s blinding red court was a little too on-the-nose as a metaphor for the bleeding Denver couldn’t stop the entire first half. Nuggets players not named Nikola Jokic started the game 1 for 23 from the field with one combined assist and six turnovers in the first 18 minutes. That one made shot was assisted by Jokic, who had a 20-point double-double by the time any of his teammates made it possible for him to have a second assist. He ended the half with three, which accounted for 50% of the remaining Nuggets’ baskets. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope started cooking late in the second quarter onward, ending with 20 points, five rebounds, five assists and three steals.

The offensive glass was the lone positive from an energy and effort standpoint early, but the Nuggets shot 8 for 23 in the paint and 2 for 10 on second-chance shot attempts in the first half, failing to capitalize on their rebounding success.

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Aaron Gordon took Zeke Nnaji’s spot at backup five after he had played for seventy-five seconds. After just 10 minutes of play, Reggie Jackson had three errors, was 0 for 4 from the field, and had a minus-23 point deficit. He was replaced two minutes into the second quarter. Denver needed 14:22, thanks to a Jokic jumper, to eventually reach 20 points. Jackson was out for the rest of the half. Collin Gillespie, who replaced Jalen Pickett in the starting backup role for the first time since November 12 (the team’s last game in Houston), was one of the ways the Nuggets attempted to scrape by in the absence of a real point guard.

That in-limbo point guard situation, combined with Jackson’s dud of a game, speaks to how much the defending champions have missed Jamal Murray since his right hamstring injury in early November. Murray once again went through a warm-up routine Friday, appearing increasingly mobile and comfortable before he missed his ninth consecutive game. Denver is 4-5 without him