On Tuesday, September 1, 2020, the Denver Nuggets and Utah Jazz played an NBA Western Conference Quarterfinal Game Seven in Orlando, Florida. The first six games of this series featured some great individual scoring performances from two of the smaller players in the series: Denver’s 6’4″ guard Jamal Murray and Utah’s 6’1″ guard Donovan Mitchell. Both of these young men are 23 years old and provided more evidence that the league’s future is in good hands. Each proved they could carry their squads offensively by scoring 50 points or better on two separate occasions during the first six games. Then Game Seven happened: A throwback game in the Orlando Bubble.
THE CENTERS CRASH THE PARTY
The Denver-Utah series featured two of the NBA’s top centers in Nikola Jokic, the versatile high-post offensive player from Serbia, and Rudy Gobert, the low-post defender and rebounder from France. Both are legitimate seven-footers who can impact a game on both ends of the floor. How cool was it to watch these two go against each other 10 feet from the basket, taking over the game, even if only for a few minutes while the perimeter shooters went cold? We’re talking about low-post footwork and stuff. Head fakes, drop steps, baby hooks, duck-under moves, and blocked or altered shots at the rim.
In color.
The playoffs are like that, and Game Sevens are really like that. There’s something about those elimination games that makes defenders more eager to guard the three-point line. And Denver and Utah are two teams that earn their money on the defensive end, despite the flurry of points in the first six games. Both teams had the ability to adjust when the perimeter game wasn’t working and both did as their centers played a larger role. It’s a shame they both couldn’t win the game, and Utah’s Mike Conley had a decent opportunity to win the game on the last shot.
WAIT, THAT WAS THE FINAL SCORE?
Just take a look at that final score again: Denver 80, Utah 78. The game wasn’t shortened, wasn’t played on 15-foot rims in the dark. And it wasn’t played on ice. This was a 48-minute regulation game on a regulation-sized basketball court in 2020 with current rules, including that three-point line, in effect. Only in Game Three of this series did the two teams combine for less than Game Seven’s final 158 points at the end of three quarters. Just a few weeks ago, Dallas and Houston played to an 85-75 score. At halftime.
This game would have struggled to get one of the teams to the century mark unless it went to double-overtime. And that’s OK. We need a low-scoring game like this every now and then, be it a result of smothering defenses, poor offensive execution, or some combination of both. Most fans like scoring and the rules in place make it clear that the league is fan-friendly. One game like this one won’t kill the league. And as we go deeper into the playoffs, the high-scoring games will become less frequent, as we’ve now reached the point where you’d better be guarding somebody if you want to advance.
IT WASN’T KAREEM VERSUS WILT, BUT WE’LL TAKE IT
Denver’s Nikola Jokic led all scorers with 30 points and grabbed 14 rebounds. Utah’s Rudy Gobert led all players with 18 rebounds and added 19 points, second on his team. Both shot a high percentage. After spending the first six games watching helplessly as long shots and long rebounds sailed over both their heads, Game Seven was their time to shine as the exhausted perimeter players struggled with their shooting.
It wasn’t Kareem versus Wilt, but we’ll take it.
The two stars of the series through game six, Murray and Donovan, combined to shoot 16-for-38 in Game Seven, including 3-for-14 from three-point range. They were both gassed, and this is neither the first or last time we’ll see legs too wobbly to carry a team with perimeter shooting late in a playoff series, even with no travel involved. But with the way the game is played now and rosters assembled to play that style, most teams don’t have the luxury of asking their bigs to carry the team on their backs.
BETTER BOTTLE THIS ONE
Those of us who enjoy the low-post battles will have to bottle this one. The overall pace of today’s average NBA contest will not change after one game. There will be less space on the court for the next three rounds of playoffs, but we’ll still see plenty of long-range shooting and some high-scoring contests, dominated by the smaller players. Even in this game, both teams managed to combine for 65 three-point field goal attempts, connecting on only 16. When that’s happening during an elimination game, those dunks and layups and midrange buckets begin to look appetizing.
Pretty sure I’m in the minority, but for those of us eager for some action in the paint involving centers, this one is for the archives as 21st-century contests go. Think we can get another one before October?
Photo by Mike Flamenco on Unsplash
