Key Takeaways: Nuggets vs. Wizards

The Nuggets lost a heart-breaker in the Pepsi Center, losing by five to the Wizards.

This was such a roller-coaster of a basketball game, with twists and turns at every corner. There was good, and there was bad with this team tonight. Some were more obvious than others, but in the end this was a hard-fought game that just came up short for Denver.

While some events outweighed others on the momentum scale, this game remained close throughout. No team truly looked like they were head and shoulders better than the other.

What should we take from this game? What do the Nuggets need to work on, who played well, and what questions remain unanswered? All of these topics and more will be discussed, starting now.

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• The Nuggets, once again, were too careless with the basketball.

Turnovers killed them in this game, just as they did against the Jazz, as the Wizards just piled it on from there. I’m not as frustrated with the overall team as I was after the Jazz game, but turnovers are what lost this game. According to ESPN, the Nuggets only forced the Wizards to commit 15 turnovers, while they themselves committed 25. Washington also had 29 points off of said turnovers while Denver had nine. Ball security has got to become a focal point in this offense if they want something to happen in the upcoming schedule.

• Even through the turnovers, this team showed fight at the end.

This is the last time I’ll mention the Jazz game, but this looked like a different team than then. The Nuggets gave up against Utah, as they suffered a 28-3 run late in that game. That wasn’t the case here. Denver fought tooth and nail to the end against the Wizards, coming down to the final 15 seconds. At this point they watched John Wall sink two free throws and their chance to win the game disappeared. I saw a fight in this team though, something that could be beneficial to them later on down the stretch.

• Nikola Jokic found his stroke, but maybe the Nuggets don’t want him to score.

You be the judge, as the Joker went for 29 points on 9-14 shooting, including a clutch three to bring the Nuggets within two in the final minute. He looked a lot more comfortable shooting the basketball tonight, and it showed. The reason this is a big deal is because in the previous six quarters before tonight, Jokic had a total of seven points. Now the question rises, do the Nuggets really want him to score? When asked before the game today about his scoring, Jokic said that he didn’t mind not scoring if the team wins. That they did against the Kings, and Jokic didn’t score a single point. Would Denver benefit more from him being a facilitator, or a go-to guy? Again, you be the judge.

• Finally, the officiating looked a bit sketchy towards the end of this game against the Nuggets.

By no means am I saying that it cost the game for the squad, as several reasons could be the reason for that. What I am saying is that there were quite a few momentum calls that went against the Nuggets. First example is late in the fourth quarter, in which Otto Porter Jr. was driving for a lay-up. Nikola Jokic slid over in the paint, and went up to contest the lay-up with his arms straight up in the air. Porter drives into him, and it looks like good defense as he misses the shot. That is, until the referee decided to blow the whistle when the shot was almost in a Nuggets’ player’s hands. This draws the question to me, would they have called it if the shot had went in?

The other notable incident took place with under a minute to go in the game. Jamal Murray came off of a screen from Jokic and buried a clutch mid-range shot to cut the game to two. As the shot was falling, Jokic was shoved to the floor, to no call. Timeout was called by Washington and the teams walked off of the floor. When the game came back, however, Bradley Beal was at the line for the Wizards for a technical free throw. As it turns out, while walking back to the team’s bench, Nikola Jokic accidentally bumped into Wizards head coach Scott Brooks, and the officials saw this as an act bad enough to call a tech for. This being said, I hate the severity of the call here.

THAT was apparently malicious enough for a technical foul with under a minute to go in a two-point ballgame. I just feel that it seems suspect, if that’s the middle of the second quarter then I get the call. In that situation, no way. Again, the Nuggets can’t blame the refs for this game, but this is an interesting situation.

Next: Nuggets Wizards recap

That should do it. It was a hard-fought game, but the Nuggets will look to bounce back against the Charlotte Hornets on Wednesday.