Denver kicked off its historic first NBA Finals run with a bang
Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets faced some question marks ahead of their first appearance in the NBA Finals, but the answers didn't take long, and they came in a particularly glaring way. A week and a half off didn't hurt the Nuggets, and they got off to a flying start in their debut appearance in the battle for the championship trophy.
The Serbian made a triple-double, and Jamal Murray scored 26 points for the Denver team, which had no problems on the way to a 104:93 victory in game #1 of the series. The two-time MVP winner finished with 27 points, 14 assists and 10 rebounds for the Nuggets, who waited 47 years to reach the Finals and did not disappoint.
"The most important thing is to win one game," Jokic said after his ninth triple-double in this year's playoffs and his sixth in his last seven games. Aaron Gordon added 16 points and Michael Porter Jr. scored 14 for Denver. Bam Adebayo finished with a double-double for Miami after 26 points and 13 rebounds, and Jimmy Butler made just 6 of 14 attempts and scored just 13 points.
Denver dominated the first three quarters and led before the start of the final quarter with 84:63. Miami's players stepped up in the final half, starting with a run of 11 unanswered points and closing the gap to 10 points with 10 minutes left, but couldn't pull off a turnaround.
Nuggets coach Michael Malone held a quiz of sorts among his players Thursday morning, peppering them with questions about game tactics and what they should do in the most important game yet in franchise history. Then they had all the answers. They also had them during the fight itself. Denver was the team with the least experience in the NBA Finals, with only two basketball players from the team having participated in a title battle before, yet they were completely swimming in their own waters in front of their home crowd in Game #1.
Jokic became just the second player in the last 25 years -- the other being LeBron James in 2017 -- to record 10 assists by halftime in a Finals game. He had 10 points and 10 assists by the break, and Denver led 59-42 after the first two quarters.
If anything can calm Miami now, it's the stats. The Heat lost the opening game of the Finals in each of the years they made it to the title -- 2006, 2012 and 2013. Their only Game 1 win was in 2011, a series they ended up losing to Dallas. Game 2 of the series is back in Denver on Sunday.
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