RealGM

Nuggets vs Pelicans is all about the Nuggets' motion.

If our guys don't move their feet on defense, they commit a lot of fouls and the Pelicans get a lot of free throws.

If our guys don't move on offense, we get very few free throws.

Typically, New Orleans gets twice as many free throws as Denver - often even three times as many.

Motion is the key for the Nuggets IMO.

Talk about under-achievers ?? NOP easily has the talent to be a playoff team, they've beaten some really good teams and lost to lottery talent...what a waste !

Important win for our #3-mission and one of the many this year where the team make a double-digit lead already in 1st quarter so the opponent never takes the lead, but this time we almost wasted everything at the weird very last minute Another good thing is that someone must lose in tonight's Clippers-Suns game.

Jokic MVP and Porter all-star as usual, and this time X-Fac(U)tor role goes to Campazzo.

Great 1st quarter and sorta' coasted from there. The Nuggets are playing just good enough to win. I would love to see them assert themselves through the whole game.

NuggetsWY wrote:I would love to see them assert themselves through the whole game.

They pretty much did, were up in double digits until 3 min. left, then some brainfarts / dumb TOs made it a close game unnecessarily

Richard Miller wrote:

NuggetsWY wrote:I would love to see them assert themselves through the whole game.

They pretty much did, were up in double digits until 3 min. left, then some brainfarts / dumb TOs made it a close game unnecessarily

Actually, they didn't really assert themselves through the entire game.

They took a 10 point lead at the end of the 1st quarter.
They were out-scored by 1 point in the 2nd quarter.
The two teams were tied in the 3rd quarter
and as you indicated, they just let the 4th quarter go to New Orleans.

Even the best of teams have trouble winning all four quarters against the worst of teams. But if the Nuggets are worth of their 66% winning percentage, they should be able to win at least 2 or maybe 3 quarters against a team with a 50% winning percentage.

The Nuggets tend to play down to the level of their opponents. The good news is, they also tend to ramp up their play when they play the better teams.

NuggetsWY wrote:
Even the best of teams have trouble winning all four quarters against the worst of teams. But if the Nuggets are worth of their 66% winning percentage, they should be able to win at least 2 or maybe 3 quarters against a team with a 50% winning percentage.

I'd say they had the double digit lead most of the time. Not sure how much is viable to blow the Pelicans 20+ ili 30+ (i.e. if they kept winning every quarter by 5 or more after the first), they are not Houston.