NBA: Nuggets Remain Under the Radar
The Denver Nuggets have only one loss on the season, and are still flying under the radar for some reason. Not to mention that they already have wins over the Golden State Warriors, New Orleans Pelicans, and Utah Jazz. All of those teams reached the Second Round in the playoffs last season. The Nuggets are one of the best teams in the league and the statistics back it up. Denver is tied for 4th in the league in rebounds with 48.8 per game and are third in the NBA in defensing rating (100.9) and net rating (9.5), trailing only the Golden State Warriors and Milwaukee Bucks in the latter. Part of Denver's success has been because of their talented big men: Nikola Jokic and Paul Millsap. Those two combine for 31.0 points and 17.4 rebounds.
Also, it helps that their big man, Jokic, is also the best pure passer on the team. He is leading the team with 7.7 assists per game and gives the Nuggets something unique from most teams. When Jokic has the ball, any number of things can come from it, and he's dangerous in every facet of the game. He leads the team in assists, blocks, and steals. The leading scorer for Denver has been Garry Harris, who is scoring 18.9 points on 48.1 percent from the field, and there are eight other players shooting better than 40 percent. In fact, three players are knocking down more than 50 percent of their shots as Mason Plumlee (66.7%), Will Barton (57.1%), and Jokic (51.9%) have been on fire to start the season.
Denver missed out on the playoffs by just one game last year and it seems like they refuse to let it come down to the wire again. Obviously we're still really early in the season and the Nuggets have 73 more games left on the schedule, but as long as they keep playing at this level, we'll see them playing in the postseason. For now? They remain the only team in the league to have beaten the two-time defending champions Warriors and have a shot at knocking off another one of the top teams in the NBA as they take on the Boston Celtics on November 5th. It's yet another game where Denver has a chance to prove just how good of a team they are. After that, the Nuggets have a couple of winnable games against the Memphis Grizzlies and Brooklyn Nets.
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