We’ve been monitoring the NBA.com Power Rankings all season and have seen the Nuggets ride the proverbial roller coaster. Early in the season, when the team was struggling to stay above .500, they fell as low as 14th in the rankings, a truly middle-of-the-pack team.
Around the All-Star break, the team peaked and jumped as high as fourth in the rankings. For the most part, they’ve stabilized right around sixth in the rankings, compiled weekly by John Schuhmann, and that’s where they spent the past two weeks.
Nuggets nearly tumble out of top 10
But after a brutal 0-4 week, the Nuggets dropped to ninth place in the latest installment of the power rankings. This isn’t exactly where Denver wants to be with just one week remaining in the regular season.
At a time when almost every other contending team in the Western Conference’s top eight is surging (apologies to the Grizzlies), the Nuggets are going in the opposite direction. They’re currently tied in the loss column with four other teams and with three games remaining, if they don’t right the ship in a hurry, they’re going to end up in the play-in tournament.
Jamal Murray in jeopardy of missing playoffs
That seemed like an impossibility just a few weeks ago, but things have gone downhill in a hurry. Beyond that, Jamal Murray has now missed five consecutive games and Michael Malone indicated that he’s dealing with a legitimate injury and he’s not a lock to return for the start of the playoffs.
We’ve seen the Nuggets play without Murray or with a compromised version of Jamal in multiple recent playoff runs, and none of them have gone well. As good as Nikola Jokic is, this team needs a healthy Murray to have any sliver of hope.
6 West teams ahead of Denver in Power Rankings
Emphasizing the problem that Denver is facing, the Western Conference has seven of the top nine teams in the latest power rankings, with six ahead of the Nuggets. The Clippers jumped to eighth, the Timberwolves to seventh, the Lakers to sixth, and the top five stayed the same in descending order with the Warriors, Rockets, Celtics, Cavaliers, and the Thunder holding the top spot.
It just shows what the Nuggets are up against and why they must turn things around ASAP. This is the worst possible time to hit a rut like this and if they aren’t careful, they are going to end up playing to keep their season alive next week.
Somehow losing in the play-in tournament and missing out on the playoffs entirely would be an unmitigated disaster and almost certainly lead to the end of this version of the team as we know it.