DENVER _ Coming off a hard-fought win the previous night in Phoenix, it hardly was surprising that the undermanned Nets were running on empty when they arrived to face the rested Nuggets Tuesday night at Pepsi Center. Neither was it a shock to the system that the Nets didn't come close to containing versatile Nuggets big men Nikola Jokic and Paul Millsap because that has been a problem all season.
Jokic and Millsap combined to score 58 points on 23-for-36 shooting to lead the Nuggets to a 112-104 victory over the Nets, who lost for the fourth time in five games.
But the most disturbing aspect of the Nets was the seemingly indifferent performance of point guard D'Angelo Russell, who is the centerpiece of their rebuilding project. One night after leading the Nets to victory over the Suns with a stellar fourth-quarter performance, Russell played a careless eight-turnover game that forced coach Kenny Atkinson to bench him for the final 17:43 of the game.
Russell played well enough on the offensive end, scoring 12 points and passing out six assists, but besides his turnovers, there were times he seemed utterly lost on defense. In the past two games, Russell has recorded 13 total turnovers. It's an issue he must address going forward.
In any case, there was no stopping Jokic, who scored 41 points on 16-for-25 shooting and added 10 rebounds. Millsap totaled 17 points on 7-for-11 shooting. The Nuggets (6-5) also got 17 points from Will Barton. The Nets (4-7) were paced by 21 points from center Tyler Zeller and also got 13 points from Caris LeVert. But they had 22 turnovers.
Without injured forwards Rondae Hollis-Jefferson and Trevor Booker, the undersized Nets were at a severe disadvantage in terms of trying to contain Nuggets center Jokic and power forward Millsap. "It's a challenge, especially the way they offensive rebound," Atkinson said before the game. "We're on the road in a back-to-back, and we have to think out of the box a little.
"If we do go small, we can create some open shots. The offense has looked good with DeMarre (Carroll) at the four. He can bring it up. He spaces the floor, and he can attack a closeout and cause mismatches that way."
That was the theory anyway. But the Jokic-Millsap pairing combined for 16 first-quarter points as the Nuggets moved out to a 28-21 first-quarter lead. Midway through the second period, the Nets trimmed an eight-point deficit to two while Jokic was on the bench resting. As soon as he returned to the game, he and Millsap combined to score 13 straight Nuggets points as they pushed their lead to 13 near the end of the second quarter.
Jokic was virtually unstoppable in the third quarter, draining 15 points in that period alone. But the Nets also blew whatever chance they might have had at a comeback with their turnovers.
After trimming five points of an 18-point Nuggets lead, Russell promptly committed two careless turnovers on consecutive possessions, and the Nuggets converted both into baskets. That's where Atkinson showed Russell to a seat on the bench. The Nuggets went on to lead by as much as 24 points in the third quarter before Atkinson emptied his bench and gave time to his lightly used players the rest of the game.
