2025 NBA PLAYOFFS West First Round: #4 Denver Nuggets vs #5 LA Clippers (DEN leads 1-0)

[scrabbarista]

I always watch on my phone, but I'm going to break the monitor out of the closet for Game 1 today.

[scrabbarista]

Final answer (after going back and forth with these teams in my brackets. LOL): Denver Nuggets in six games, maybe 7 out of respect for the Clippers. i just can't see Jokic losing in the first round after a historical regular season (where he won't win the MVP award, which should add to his motivation).

GO JOKIC, GO NUGGETS!

Definite along with Houston/GSW series, either teams can win. Whoever wants and battles harder will win.

My guess is that Joker will not let the Nuggets lose.

Nuggets in 6.

And Nuggets Wolves.

(I have Lakers in 6.)

[FrodoBaggins]

Watch on YouTube

The Clippers forcing middle doesn't surprise me. Jeff Van Gundy is a Dick Bennett pack-line defense disciple. His NYK and HOU teams always tried to funnel the ball handler into the middle of the court, where the help defense is. His brother Stan and Pat Riley were also pack-line proponents.

[TrustFundBaby]

Might be the best series in R1, which is saying a lot considering the entire West looks to be a banger.

Gonna go with the crowd here and cite Denver's poor form recently and firing of the GM/HC being destabilizing enough to be reasons for why they probably lose. They have Jokic tho and he can make **** happen tho.

LAC is just well built and well coached. Harden and Kawhi's resurgence, Powell and Zu's emergence, they honestly have a stacked SL. And Ty Lue has been known to be great with playoffs tactics, vs the unknown coaching DEN. Thinking LAC in 6 because Jokic is the best player in the world so that alone is winning DEN games

[bisme37]

It took all 82 games (and even an extra five minutes for LA), but the Nuggets and Clippers clinched their Playoff berths in Sunday’s regular-season finale.

The teams put up matching 50-32 records and split their season series 2-2, but Denver’s superior conference record gave them the 4 seed and home-court advantage in this matchup that tips off today (3:30 ET, ESPN).

The top performers in their head-to-head matchups:
Nikola Jokić (DEN): 28.3 ppg, 10 rpg, 5.7 apg, 54.2/52.4 shooting splits
Jamal Murray (DEN): 20.3 ppg, 6 apg, 52.7/52.4 shooting splits
Norman Powell (LAC): 27.8 ppg, 4.8 3pm, 53.6/48.7 shooting splits
James Harden (LAC): 23.3 ppg, 9.3 apg

One name missing from that list of stars is Kawhi Leonard, who missed all four games against Denver this season but has been healthy and outstanding down the stretch.

Klaw Back: Since his season debut on Jan. 4, Leonard played in 37 of the scheduled 47 games, with LA going 26-11 with him in the lineup

Deja Vu: Harden has made the Playoffs in all 16 years of his career. His 22.8 ppg and 8.7 apg helped him in an 11th All-Star appearance, while leading the league in isolation scoring (9.0 ppg) for the 8th time in the last decade

Starting 5: LA’s lineup of Harden, Powell, Leonard, Ivica Zubac and Derrick Jones Jr. posted the 5th-best defensive rating (102.9) and 2nd-best net rating (21.8) among five-man lineups with 190 minutes played together

Big Zu: Zubac (career-highs 16.8 ppg, 12.6 rpg) not only has the best on/off court on the Clippers (12.8 pts per 100 poss better on the court than off), he’s held Jokić to 44.1% shooting (13.5% below his season average) and forced 9 turnovers in 25:20 of matchup time


Can Zubac and the Clippers contain the 3-time Kia MVP over the course of a seven-game series? Or will Jokić continue to play at the historic level he did all season?

Doing It All: Jokić became the first player to finish top three in points (29.6, 3rd), rebounds (12.7, 3rd) and assists (10.2, 2nd) since the league began tracking leaders on a per-game basis in 1969-70, while becoming the third player to average a triple-double

Unprecedented Shooting: Jokić became the first player to shoot at least 55% from the field (57.6, 9th) and 40% from 3 (41.7%, 18th) in a season (min. 300 3PA)

New Voice: The Nuggets head into the postseason with a new head coach, David Adelman, after the team parted with longtime coach Mike Malone late in the year. Denver has started 3-0 under Adelman

[ejftw]

Jokic shooting over Zubac when guarded 1on1
28/73
Les than 40%
This is the lowest % anybody in NBA has over Jokic

Jokic vs Clippers this season in 3 games.

28.3/10/5.7 on 54.2%/52.4%/62.5%

Zubac is a great defender, that is why Jokic is not going at him in 1on1 so much. Some of it is just trying to put him into foul trouble.
Problem for Clippers could be Jokic on perimeter and Zu on him, with nobody to protect the paint against Nuggets cutters.

Wouldn't be shocked if Lue uses a decent amount of zone during spot moments along with living with Jokic taking 6+ there's a game (was around 4 I believe in regular season) versus getting Zu out of position/in foul trouble.

Whether that works/is smart/is even done will be fun to see.

Honestly, the amount of story lines/x factor scenarios for this series is quite...insane.

[BelgradeNugget]

Jokic shooting over Zubac when guarded 1on1
28/73
Les than 40%
This is the lowest % anybody in NBA has over Jokic

Jokic vs Clippers this season in 3 games.

28.3/10/5.7 on 54.2%/52.4%/62.5%

Zubac is a great defender, that is why Jokic is not going at him in 1on1 so much. Some of it is just trying to put him into foul trouble.
Problem for Clippers could be Jokic on perimeter and Zu on him, with nobody to protect the paint against Nuggets cutters.

Wouldn't be shocked if Lue uses a decent amount of zone during spot moments along with living with Jokic taking 6+ there's a game (was around 4 I believe in regular season) versus getting Zu out of position/in foul trouble.

Whether that works/is smart/is even done will be fun to see.

Honestly, the amount of story lines/x factor scenarios for this series is quite...insane.

We have already seen some interesting tactics against Jokic/Nuggets this season. Lakers used full court body on body defense on him with Vando. When he went in the post with smaler defender they would double team denying him the ball. Problem was Malone kept calling Jokic in the post plays and Nuggets couldn't pass him the ball there and offense was broken. Now with Adelman other players will have more freedom to chose actions in this cases.

One team even played box and 1 vs him.

This will be athletics, basketball skill and chess match all in one.

[Woodsanity]

Gonna be a tough series for the Nuggets. Could go either way but on paper Clippers seem more stacked and they have someone who can give Jokic a bit of trouble in Zubac. If Kawhi stays healthy then I favor the Clippers slightly.

[OkcSinceSGA]

Super excited. It's going to be a chess match of epic proportions. THE Grandmaster Jokic vs Ty Lue and the orchestra of James Harden. It's going to be a series of constant adjustments I'm sure. No crappy coach in Doc to mess up the series with a 3-1 choke IMO.

Sadly I'm working a 12 hour day today and have 3 sales lined up, so I won't be watching but I'll watch a repeat once I'm home somewhere hopefully.

[Darklight]

Thoughest first round to predict, but I will say Clippers in 6. Jokic is by far the best player in this series, but denver has no defense and a D-league bench easily the worst of any playoff team.. I don't trust either Murray or MPJ especially MPJ, Gordon defense this season has fallen off. Clippers are stacked and have a great bench.

Let Denver trade for KD in the summer and I'm good.

[OkcSinceSGA]

Thoughest first round to predict, but I will say Clippers in 6. Jokic is by far the best player in this series, but denver has no defense and a D-league bench easily the worst of any playoff team.. I don't trust either Murray or MPJ especially MPJ, Gordon defense this season has fallen off. Clippers are stacked and have a great bench.

Let Denver trade for KD in the summer and I'm good.

The reason I have so much trouble predicting this series though is... Denver like in 2023 showed they can step up defensively when it counts with TEAM defense. I know they had KCP... but still. The Clippers similarly have shown they can be the #1 offense in the league the last 20 games vs a meh schedule with everyone healthy. So what if the versions we THINK we see in these teams (Elite offense, bad defense vs mediocre offense, elite defense) aren't real when the playoffs start? What if the Clippers defense slips, and Denver becomes more defensive minded for this run?

[OkcSinceSGA]

Watch on YouTube

The Clippers forcing middle doesn't surprise me. Jeff Van Gundy is a Dick Bennett pack-line defense disciple. His NYK and HOU teams always tried to funnel the ball handler into the middle of the court, where the help defense is. His brother Stan and Pat Riley were also pack-line proponents.

His coaching years were of teams I didn't watch, when I was very young. So I didn't know it's a JVG staple. They force middle, then have Kawhi, Dunn, Batum, DJ, even Harden swiping low at the ball for steals so that it SEEMS wide open, but it really isn't. Unfortunately there is a 90% chance IMO that JVG gets stolen to be a head coach of one of these new vacancies.

[PushDaRock]

This is the most interesting series in the first round, Kawhi looks like he is back in prime form.

[Exp0sed]

Jokic shooting over Zubac when guarded 1on1
28/73
Les than 40%
This is the lowest % anybody in NBA has over Jokic

Jokic vs Clippers this season in 3 games.

28.3/10/5.7 on 54.2%/52.4%/62.5%

Zubac is a great defender, that is why Jokic is not going at him in 1on1 so much. Some of it is just trying to put him into foul trouble.
Problem for Clippers could be Jokic on perimeter and Zu on him, with nobody to protect the paint against Nuggets cutters.

Wouldn't be shocked if Lue uses a decent amount of zone during spot moments along with living with Jokic taking 6+ there's a game (was around 4 I believe in regular season) versus getting Zu out of position/in foul trouble.

Whether that works/is smart/is even done will be fun to see.

Honestly, the amount of story lines/x factor scenarios for this series is quite...insane.

why would Lue use a zone? for one, Clippers have the personel to defend the Nuggets at almost every position and if the key is Jokic - Zu is about as good defender for Jokic a team can hope for. moreover, if the Clips go zone, coach will just put Jokic, with the ball in his hands, in the middle of the floor and...good luck with zone defense against that look

[DonaldSanders]

This is the most interesting series in the first round, Kawhi looks like he is back in prime form.

Yup, Clippers are the dark horse of the playoffs if Kawhi continues to play like this.

[Clutch0z24]

So Excited for this series....As a Raps fan im excited to watch hopefully prime Kawhi have some playoff magic like he had with us....I feel if any year for Kawhi to win again it will be this year...

[CodeBreaker]

Why does the anticipation of this game feels like a Western Conference Finals matchup

[KIRAG]

This series and the Knicks and Pistons are the ones I'm excited for today

[OkcSinceSGA]

Starting 5 confirmed for each team:

Harden
Dunn
Powell
Leonard
Zu

vs

Murray
Braun
MPJ
AG
Jokic

My guess defensively for Denver is Braun on Harden, Murray on Dunn, MPJ on Powell, AG on Kawhi and Jokic on Zu.

Clippers defensive matchup: Harden on MPJ, Dunn on Murray, Powell on MPJ, Kawhi on AG, Zu on Jokic.

Thoughts?

[Wolfgang630]

Starting 5 confirmed for each team:

Harden
Dunn
Powell
Leonard
Zu

vs

Murray
Braun
MPJ
AG
Jokic

My guess defensively for Denver is Braun on Harden, Murray on Dunn, MPJ on Powell, AG on Kawhi and Jokic on Zu.

Clippers defensive matchup: Harden on MPJ, Dunn on Murray, Powell on MPJ, Kawhi on AG, Zu on Jokic.

Thoughts?

Sounds about right