Demoralizing loss for Nuggets in game of the year reeks of all too familiar odor

The story of the game will be the heroics of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who hit an incredible game-winning shot for the Thunder to beat the Nuggets, 129-126, on Monday night. This one had lots of hype, and it lived up to it and then some.

Denver had their entire starting lineup intact against a hobbled OKC team, smelling blood in the water, they jumped out to an early lead, and David Adelman handled his rotations like a playoff game. Nikola Jokic had an MVP-like performance, and Aaron Gordon looked all the way back, and yet, it wasn’t enough.

And for the Nuggets, the more things change, the more they stay the same. This year was supposed to be different. But it’s starting to feel the same as it’s ever been.

Nuggets supporting cast not good enough

Jokic was great, Murray and Gordon were good, and they didn’t get enough help. They couldn’t get stops. And the non-Jokic minutes were a disaster. They devoted the entire offseason to fixing these problems, and somehow, they persist. 

Even with an incredible Tim Hardaway Jr. shooting night, with 28 points off the bench, Jokic’s 32/14/13 masterpiece, a solid 21/8/6 from Jamal, and 23 and 10 from AG, they couldn’t solve the Thunder.

Nobody else on the team scored more than 6 points. Cam Johnson pulled another disappearing act. Bruce Brown’s minutes were brutal. Jonas Valanciunas proved to be unplayable. THJ hit eight three-pointers. The rest of the team hit seven.

The last few years, we’ve heard nothing but excuses about how Jokic was let down by the supporting cast, so they built a roster that’s supposed to be 10-deep, and when the chips are down, it makes no difference. At the end of the day, it’s still Jokic, Gordon, and Murray, and everything beyond that feels like a toss-up at best.

That’s a scary thought when we’re just over a month away from the playoffs, and it doesn’t seem like things are close to clicking.

OKC has Denver's number

Sure, Peyton Watson missed this game. Sure, SGA made two unbelievable shots to ice this game and likely put the finishing touches on a second straight MVP award. Sure, you could chalk this up to a moral victory, losing at the buzzer in Oklahoma City in a hard-fought, instant classic game.

But that wouldn’t tell the real story, and those are just excuses. The reality is that the Thunder were missing Jalen Williams, Chet Holmgren, Alex Caruso, and Isaiah Hartenstein. The Nuggets jumped out to a 21-8 lead and had a chance to make a statement. 

Instead, they quickly let the Thunder back in the game, they got completely dominated by SGA, and let role players like Jaylin Williams, Jared McCain, and Ajay Mitchell destroy them. It took a near miraculous final minutes from Jokic to even have a chance at the end of this one.

The Nuggets are out of excuses. They’re 0-3 against the Thunder on the season, and they’ve let yet another one slip away in crunch time. With the loss, Denver is now 39-26 on the season, just one game in the loss column ahead of the Suns for the seven seed in the West, and a dreaded trip to the play-in tournament.

The sky isn’t falling. There’s still time to get it right. But this is certainly a wake-up call, and it’s far from the first one. Denver’s next three games are at home against the Rockets, then at the Spurs, and at the Lakers. They need to bounce back with some big wins before things really start to spiral.