Few defenders have found ways to stop the Nuggets Nikola Jokic superstar during a race that has already presented three MVP awards and could add another in a few weeks, but for a short time on Saturday, assistant to the clippers and the former chief coach of the Knicks, Jeff Van Gundy found a way.
With remaining 34 seconds and the clippers in position to use a challenge after a Kawhi Leonard turnover, Jokic wanted to train the ball quickly.
From Gundy’s coach and the clippers, Jasen Powell, he thought, tried to fight his ball while sitting on the bank in a strange NBA playoff scene.
The Nuggets followed one at that time and the clippers escaped that they received a delay of the game’s warning, but after Lue risked to use their final challenge and waiting time, the call ended up being confirmed, and Denver ended up receiving possession, anyway.
“It looked pretty good,” said Christian Braun of the Nuggets to Gundy’s journalists, In accordance with Denver’s post. “I mean, he is a hero. [Jokic]. But he was in the weight room later, so that’s good. “
Jokic joked the journalists who were “two against one” and that is why he could not overcome Gundy in his first season as the main assistant of the clippers after spending the 2023-24 campaign as a senior consultant of Celtics and Power.
It ended with 29 points, 12 assists and nine rebounds as the Nuggets left a wild end to the fourth quarter and extra time with a 112-110 victory to take an advantage of the 1-0 series.
“I mean, my boys have to intensify it. If we are allowed to simply take the ball and prevent the plays from occurring and it is not a delay of the game, what have we done all year?” The Nuggets interim coach, David Adelman, told the journalists of the sequence with Gundy, Powell and Jokic, according to the Denver Post. “I was an assistant, so what was I doing all year? So, if that’s fine, and I guess it’s fine, then I guess we should start doing it. Never before, to be honest.”
A similar incident Deployed in the 2023 playoffs between Jokic and Mat IshbiaWhen Jokic pushed the Suns owner while trying to recover the ball.
James Harden led the clippers with 32 points, while Leonard added 22 and Ivica Zubac poured 21 points and collected 13 rebounds.
But the former Clippers guard, Russell Westbrook, hit the clutch shots for nuggets in the section, including a triple with 24 seconds in the regulation, after the secondary debacle and the subsequent challenge of the clippers that was not successful, to give it a temporary advantage of two points.
Harden turned a shot at the other end, thought and sent the game on extra time.
In game 2 on Monday before the series changes to Los Angeles, the teams measure.
