Boy did the Nuggets ever bounce back from their ugly loss to the Lakers on Saturday night. They took the floor on Monday in Indiana and looked like a team that was anxious to get a bad taste out of their mouth, taking care of a very solid Pacers team, 125-116.
After the eye-opening home loss to LA, the talk was all centered around JJ Redick’s amazing gameplan and how they were able to almost completely take Nikola Jokic out of the game, holding him to just 12 points on 2/7 shooting and 10 assists for the night in a game that Denver lost by 23 points.
Jokic sets new career-high with 19 assists vs Pacers
Well, that was not the case on Monday night as Jokic controlled the game from the word go, mostly through his passing. He had the ball on a string and had the Indiana defenders chasing ghosts as he carved them up for a career-high 19 assists.
Amazingly, Jokic has had two games with 18 assists, three games with 17 assists, and 11 games with 16 assists, but this was his first time reaching 19. He pulled off the feat in just 38 minutes, meaning he averaged an assist for every two minutes that he was on the court.
He also added 18 points and 9 rebounds and the Nuggets were a team-high +17 during Jokic’s minutes.
Jokic ties Wilt Chamberlain for 2nd most assists by a center
The 19 dimes for Jokic ties him with the legendary Wilt Chamberlain for the second-most all-time by a center. Chamberlain still holds the record with a 21 assists performance, but Jokic is now responsible for 20 of the top 25 assist games by a center in league history, with Chamberlain having the other five.
Jokic had 19 assists tonight this list of most of assists by a center in a game is crazy. Jokic had 20 of the top 25 and Wilt has the other 5 pic.twitter.com/sPjuBWR0yi
— Robert Littal BSO (@BSO) February 25, 2025
Maybe Jokic will catch Wilt someday and set the mark, but even if he doesn’t it’s fitting for him to be in this rarified air. Chamberlain has become almost a mythical figure with his jaw-dropping stat lines and records from back in the day.
But what people may not realize is that Jokic is the modern-day version of that in many ways. Statistically, Jokic is breaking basketball in ways that haven’t been seen since the days of Chamberlain. He’s near the top in almost every statistical category and puts together numbers that almost defy logic.
Almost every silly new Jokic stat starts or ends with “First player since Chamberlain” and you are starting to see why. In fact, it seems likely that years from now, Jokic will replace Wilt in that vein and we’ll see other great players putting up crazy stat lines that start or end with, “The first player since Jokic”.