5 Denver Nuggets goals before the Playoffs begin
By JT Matthews
4) Kick up the defensive intensity
Outside of Gary Harris and Torrey Craig, the Nuggets don’t exactly have the reputation of being a dominant defensive team. This is something we know, as Nuggets fans, has improved over the course of the last few seasons but not to a contender’s level. With the good health of Paul Milsap and Jerami Grant’s dynamic athleticism, we get a glimpse of what could be in for this team. But all too often it’s flashes of great team defense and never a consistent well-oiled defensive attack. The Nuggets, if they want to obtain that championship the crave so fiercely, need to improve defensively and that begins with effort and intensity.
Malone is a coach who has always stressed defense first and this team, I am sure, has given him ulcers at times throughout this abbreviated season. We have seen a large number of double-digit leads very simply get erased by opposing teams because we have not shown that “killer” mentality. Throughout the playoffs last season you saw glimmers of what this team could accomplish with gritty defensive play, but the consistency was spotty.
The Nuggets have a strong playoff showing under their belt from last season, so any credence to them being “young and inexperienced” needs to be removed from the dialogue . They should know the intensity it takes to win a gut-it-out, claw-and-scratch series. The talent is clearly there but the difference between a contender and a pretender is effort.
