Pelicans Fall to Nuggets Behind Jokic's 69th Career Triple Double
Denver Nuggets 116 - New Orleans Pelicans 105
New Orleans faced the Nuggets for their third game in five days stemming from the NBA restructuring the league-wide schedule from Covid absences from various teams. Of course the Pelicans get screwed over and are forced to play three back-to-backs in the span of nine days when the original schedule gave New Orleans a 3-game homestand in this time period. On Monday night, the Pelicans beat the Indiana Pacers at home 117 to 113 and then had to fly to Philadelphia to play the 76ers on Tuesday where most of the starters sat, but the team remained very competitive against one of the MVP favorites, Joel Embiid, and his gang - of course no Ben Simmons. Now New Orleans faces the current leader in the MVP race, Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets. Denver entered the night with only Will Barton out due to a non-Covid illness. Michael Porter Jr. and Jamal Murray remain out recovering from their injuries. For the Pelicans, Jonas Valanciunas missed the game due to his own non-Covid illness, and Brandon Ingram remains out with his ankle injury he experienced during New Orleans latest game against the Knicks. It was also announced last Sunday that Didi Louzada will be out indefinitely after suffering a torn meniscus in his left knee. Louzada just came back from his PED suspension but did not see much playing time during this stretch anyway. Zion Williamson started some excitement and rumblings down in New Orleans when he posted a photo of himself from a Pelicans game on his Instagram Tuesday. Some people believe he was hinting at a return to the court while some other rumors began swirling that he is back in the city of New Orleans. The young star has not been heard from a lot during his rehabbing process from the Jones fracture surgery, so Pelicans fans will keep an eye out on his status. Anyways let’s get into the game.
With Valanciunas and Ingram out, Willy Hernangomez and Garrett Temple were placed in the starting lineup. Hernangomez scored a career high 29 points and tallied 10 boards in the Pelicans last game against the 76ers. Temple, on the other hand, has had some recent shooting woes. Defensively, Josh Hart guarded Aaron Gordon while Herb Jones started on Monte Morris. On the first defensive possession, New Orleans doubled Jokic in the post and forced him to throw a cross court pass that was high and went out of bounds. The Pelicans did well on covering the closest passing options including Josh Hart picking up a cutting Denver player that forced Jokic to make the longer, more difficult pass. Temple and Hernangomez were involved in a pick and roll where they both communicated and covered for each other well that lead to a Garrett Temple steal. Offensively, the shooting woes started early as Herb Jones and Temple were both missing early corner 3’s, but Willy did get the hockey assist on a Devonte Graham 3-pointer as he back-tapped an offensive rebound that led to the make. After missing his first two 3-point attempts, Herb pump faked a closing defender and then drove past the closeout for a layup. The key to Herb being a good spacer is his willingness and confidence to pull these 3-pointers when shooting was not his forte going into the season. The second double of Jokic gave the same result as the MVP candidate threw another cross court pass over his teammate’s head out of bounds for another turnover. Josh Hart threw a bounce pass behind Hernangomez out of the pick and roll that lead to an and-one layup in transition. Herb intercepted a pass underneath the rim, but after Josh Hart pushed the fastbreak and got to the rim, he passed out of a decent look at a layup for another Garrett Temple corner 3 which Temple ended up missing. Temple ended the game with 0 points missing five total shots, four being 3-point attempts, but he did finish with 5 steals for some positivity. On another defensive possession, Hart forced Aaron Gordon out of bounds along the baseline when the referees could have called a foul but swallowed their whistles this one time. Jaxson Hayes entered the game and was called for 2 early fouls: one fighting with Jokic for a rebound and the other for grabbing Facundo Campazzo off-ball. Naji Marshall entered the game as he has seen some more playing time with the recent Pelican injuries. He had one smart play where he stepped up and drew a charge on Demarcus Cousins as Cousins was trying to drive past Hayes, but then he had a dumb play where he was called for a reach-in foul on Cousins after Cousins gathered a defensive rebound 90-feet away from the rim when the Nuggets were in the bonus. Towards the end of the quarter, the Pelicans lineup was Naji, Hayes, Jose Alvarado, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, and Gary Clark. This lineup just does not have enough offense as Nickeil is the only guy with some shot creation ability, and Jose has moments were he dribbles the air out of the ball. New Orleans was running a set play for NAW as Hayes was setting a pindown screen for him, but right when NAW was past Hayes screen for the open look, Jose decided to drive on his defender and got his shot blocked out of bounds. If Jose just waits a half second longer, NAW is open for that 3-point look. Denver finished the first half with 12 free throw attempts, in part due to some bad and soft fouls, but had 7 turnovers compared to the Pelicans 3.
To start the second quarter, NAW made some nice plays and another good passing game. He hit an open Naji Marshall in the corner for a 3-point attempt, but Naji missed it. He also attacked Cousins in the pick and roll and got an easy layup as Boogie was worried about Hayes rolling and Zeke Nnaji did not really fight over the screen at all. Nickeil had another great find to Graham in the corner who then pump faked his man closing out and hit an open mid-range shot. New Orleans doubled JaMychal Green in the post and forced another turnover as they continued to have great rotations of picking up the immediate passing threats. Graham finished a layup off of a nice curl play and then Naji Marshall began guarding the inbounder forcing Denver to call a timeout as there was no one to pass it to. I noticed a couple times in the first half that everyone on the Nuggets would jog back onto offense and not have anyone in the backcourt to inbound the ball to and bring it up court. Jaxson Hayes had a monster dunk out of the pick and roll with Graham. They set the screen above the 3-point line, but rookie Bones Hyland still went over the screen which made JaMychal Green have to guard Graham and Hayes. Hayes began to roll the second Hyland went over the screen, and Graham hit Jaxson with an easy bounce pass leading to the big dunk. Nickeil tried to double Jokic again while he was posting up, but this time Jokic hit Austin Rivers for a 3-pointer. I would rather NAW double Jokic when he was deeper in the post and closer to the baseline. On the play mentioned, Jokic was around the elbow, and the passing angles and spacing is much easier compared to being closer to the baseline. Nickeil had his one bad pass of the game where he threw it over Jose’s head after driving into the paint. It just seemed NAW was a little out of control on his drive which lead to the out of control pass. After a timeout, Jose set up a nice give and go with Willy. Jose picked up his dribble and passed it to Willy, but Jose’s defender was almost icing the pass which gave Jose a lane to the rim as Jokic could not get to the rim quick enough to contest the layup. Herb continued to show his confidence and willingness to shoot as he made his first corner 3 of the game after missing his first three attempts. However, he did not take anymore after this and finished the game 1 for 4 from 3-point range. Herb did draw Jokic’s third foul of the game as he attacked Aaron Gordon’s closeout and drew the foul on his layup attempt. Jokic checked out of the second quarter with 3:49 left while he was +7 at this point in the game, and the Nuggets decided to go small with Gordon at center. Josh Hart threw a nice pass to Willy in the post when he was being fronted for an easy finish. Bones Hyland beat Josh Hart off the dribble for a layup but had his pass intercepted by Herb on the next possession. Hyland then committed the take foul on Herb in transition when Denver had some guys back on defense already, and the Pelicans were in the bonus. The last offensive possession of the half, Graham was blitzed off the pick and roll, hits Willy as he rolls to the rim, and then Herb trails his defender who rotated to Willy for a dunk. At halftime the Pelicans only trailed 50 to 48.
One of the first offensive possessions in the third quarter, Graham picked up his dribble below the rim which lead to a bad turnover. Graham just needed to keep his dribble alive or already know who he was passing the ball to instead of just standing there and trying to figure it out. He did have two possessions in a row where he found Temple open for a corner 3 that did not go in and a Josh Hart corner 3 that did. Antonio Daniels pointed it out on the broadcast that Denver began giving Jokic the ball in the middle of the floor around the free throw line, so Jokic could see the entire floor and have more options. This just goes back to my point when NAW tried to blitz Jokic near the elbow, just too much space compared to the baseline which basically cuts your spacing in half. Hart scored on two consecutive possessions by attacking Morris and Jokic at the rim for layup finishes. Garrett Temple poked the ball free from Jokic around the 3-point line, Graham picked up the loose ball and tried finishing the layup in transition. Graham missed, but Herb got the putback even though it did look like he might have been holding onto the rim when the ball went through the basket. A minor adjustment I noticed on the Pelicans side, New Orleans defenders started going over the pick and roll screens when Monte Morris was involved. He finished the game shooting 5 for 11 from the field for 13 points. After a defensive rebound, Hernangomez had a bad pass to Hart that was intercepted by Gordon which lead to a Jokic 3-pointer. NAW had a great bounce pass to Willy off of a drive where he wrapped the pass around Jokic. The passing overall for the Pelicans was worse though. A lot more errant and dangerous passes were being thrown around in the third quarter, but New Orleans only finished with 13 total turnovers when Pelicans fans have seen much higher totals in a game before. Herb intercepted another pass around the rim on a cut which lead to another Josh Hart transition layup. Nickeil had another great pass where they blitzed him on the pick and roll. Josh Hart was the only guy to his right, and Hart’s defender sinks down to guard Willy on the roll. Nickeil looked off Hart’s defender making him hesitate and step towards Hart and then hit Willy with the pass for the easy finish. Naji Marshall overplayed Zeke Nnaji which lead to a finish at the rim over Jaxson Hayes. The Pelicans were outscored 36 to 30 in the third quarter while Jokic scored 16 points in the quarter.
To start the fourth quarter, New Orleans came out in a zone to disrupt Denver’s set play out of the break, but Bones Hyland just drilled a deep 3-pointer to ruin that plan. Nickeil had a great rotation where he disrupted a cutting Nuggets player and forced a loose ball that lead to a scoreless Denver possession. The Pelicans offense was terrible to start the fourth quarter, however. A lot of ok-ish 3-point looks that never went in. One play, Marshall airballs a 3-pointer, Hayes gathers it in the corner, drives and tries to pass back out to the 3-point line, and the pass gets intercepted leading to an and-one finish in transition. Nickeil drove into the paint for an easy layup, but his finger roll ended up rimming out somehow. Herb Jones tried throwing a pass to NAW who was at the 3-point line, but Hayes ended up intercepting the pass and finished it for a layup. Then, Herb deflected an inbound pass and threw the ball up court to Hayes who finished an and-one layup. NAW missed a 3-pointer right after getting the ball on a dribble handoff, but his feet just were not set and did not have a great base for the shot. He is just not a movement shooter right now, even compared to Graham. Nickeil did have another drive where he left the ball for Willy but did not get the assist because Willy missed the first shot attempt and then tipped in the offensive rebound. Devonte Graham went down holding his knee which had people worried, but he was back in the game after the commercial break. They showed that he hyper-extended his knee which is not that bad of an injury, apparently - I’m not a doctor. Bryn Forbes hit a ridiculous moving 3 off of a screen at the top of the key that seemed like that shot could have been the dagger, but the Pelicans kept fighting. Nickeil had another drive where he slithered around two defenders and finished a layup over Jokic. Herb poked the ball loose on a Jokic drive that lead to a jump ball. Then, Hart drove on a fastbreak and met Aaron Gordon at the rim when it looked like a foul as Gordon looked to be jumping sideways into Hart. Nickeil ended up drawing Jokic’s fifth foul late in the game, but he never ended up fouling out. Jokic hit a cutting Monte Morris with a ridiculous pass that went right past Herb’s shoulder. NAW hit a big 3-pointer to cut the lead down to six and then blocked a Forbes mid-range fade, but as the Pelicans pushed the ball in transition, Graham missed a wide open mid-range shot at the free throw line that would have been a huge bucket. After that miss, Jokic finished the game off by beasting in the paint. If he missed his shot, he would just get the offensive rebound and score right after.
At the end of the game, Jokic just showed why he is and should be the leader in the MVP race right now. The Nuggets are just significantly better with him on the floor, it is night and day. He finished with 29 points, 13 rebounds, 10 assists and was +15 in a game his team won by 11. For the Pelicans, I mentioned his name a lot, Nickeil Alexander-Walker did not have the most efficient offensive night - 18 points on 5 for 14 shooting, 2 for 8 on 3-pointers - and only had 4 assists to 3 turnovers, but he seemed to be in more control tonight than most - also was a only -1 for tonight. We just needed him to knock down some more shots tonight. Against the 76ers on Tuesday night, he scored 31 points on 11 for 22 shooting and was 5 for 9 from 3-point range. The other player to point out is Herb. 19 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists, and 5 steals while shooting 7 for 13 from the field. It has almost gotten to the point where I do not know where this team would be without Herb Jones with his defensive ability and effort, his off-ball awareness and intelligence. What a steal for a second round pick.
Back with another game review. Apologize with the extended break, dealing with some technical difficulties let’s say. The Pelicans next game is tonight, Saturday, against the Boston Celtics at 6:00.