The Golden State Warriors pulled off one of their most surprising wins of the year on Sunday, shocking the Denver Nuggets 128-117. Merely winning was surprising, given that the Nuggets are a significantly better team, and the Warriors were playing their seventh straight game without Steph Curry. But before the game tipped off, the Dubs were dealt a one-two combo of adversity, making the difficult task downright daunting.
First, a few hours before the game began, the Warriors announced that recent trade acquisition Kristaps Porziņģis, who was set to play his second game with the team, was sick and would not be able to make it to the arena. Steve Kerr made it sound like it’s a very serious illness for Porziņģis, as the coach revealed that the stretch big may not join the Warriors on their upcoming two-city road trip.
And then, just minutes before the game began, the Warriors announced that Draymond Green was dealing with a lower back injury, and wouldn’t play.
So the Dubs, sans Curry, Green, Porziņģis, and Jimmy Butler III, took on the 36-21 Nuggets, who were playing without Aaron Gordon, but were otherwise healthy.
Golden State took the challenge and ran with it from the opening tip. The starting five of Pat Spencer, De’Anthony Melton, Moses Moody, Gui Santos, and Al Horford came out firing, with incredible ball movement and some Curry-esque shooting from deep. If you blinked, you missed Horford draining a pair of triples as the Warriors immediately took an 11-2 lead.
While the Warriors’ offense was firing on all cylinders, so too was the consensus best player in the world, Nuggets center Nikola Jokić, who was picking apart Golden State’s defense. At the mandatory timeout, just over five minutes in, the Nuggets had made six field goals … and Jokić had assisted on all six of them. But crucially, the Warriors still led, as their ball movement was going tit for tat with Jokić’s wizardry.
As the first quarter went on, both offenses played beautifully. Christian Braun was feasting on the Dubs with cuts galore, while Santos was doing a little bit of everything to keep Golden State afloat. It looked like the Nuggets were about to erase the lead late, but Golden State ended the first quarter with a huge flurry, with Santos and rookie Will Richard leading the way. To the shock of everyone in the building, the Warriors led 39-27 after the opening frame, and had shot a blistering 9-for-19 from three-point range. Horford had finished the quarter with 11 electric points, while Moody had scored eight.
It’s always expected that the favored team will respond after that sort of quarter. The Warriors got their surprising punch in, but presumably the Nuggets would wake up, adjust, and play better in the second. And indeed, Denver notably tightened up their defense to open the second frame, while first-time All-Star Jamal Murray went to work, chipping away at the lead.
But the Warriors wouldn’t let him chip away too much. The second quarter was a complete team effort, with all nine healthy players contributing across the board: there were deflections and loose balls gathered, rebounds gobbled up, and plenty more threes. It was an exhausting fight for them to stay on top, but stay on top they did, and they led 76-67 at halftime, with a stunning 15 made threes. Against all odds, with Curry sidelined, they set their season record for most points in the first half.
Unfortunately, the halftime hangout sapped Golden State’s shooting ability. When they returned from the break, they had cashed in the threes for turnovers, instead. In fact, after nine threes in the first quarter and six more in the second, the Warriors didn’t make a single shot from beyond the arc in the third quarter.
And as that happened, the Nuggets chipped away. They were playing so well on offense, with Jokić now turning to scoring, rather than passing, to pick apart Golden State’s defense. On the other end, the Warriors started the frame moving the ball well, but just couldn’t hit shots. Yet as the frustration mounted, they started to force the issue, and eventually the turnovers started to fill up the stat sheet.
At the 7:05 mark, a pair of free throws from Braun tied the game. It was the first tie since it was 2-2 in the opening moments of the game. At the 4:59 mark, Denver finally took the lead.
At that point, it felt like the game was well on its way to being over. The Warriors had gotten their surprising run in early, and the Nuggets had now responded. When the talent deficit is that big, the expectation is that once the dam breaks, there’s no putting it back together. You hang onto the lead for as long as you can, and once you lose it, it’s over. And indeed, it felt that way, as the Nuggets pushed the lead to eight points, which somehow felt insurmountable.
Turns out it wasn’t, though. Though the Warriors trailed 101-95 entering the fourth quarter, they still brought the energy and confidence to the fourth quarter.
Golden State opened the scoring in the final frame with a Brandin Podziemski and-one. And then, at the 10:02 mark, they tied the game when Gary Payton II kicked the lid off the bucket and drained a three. It was the team’s first triple of the half, and ended a stretch of 14 consecutive misses from beyond the arc.
The Nuggets would soon have a five-point lead, once again giving many the sense that the Warriors had used up their shots at an upset. And then they flipped the game entirely on its head. Payton made another three, and at the 6:00 mark, Moody scored at the rim in transition, tying the game and forcing the Nuggets to call timeout.
That timeout did nothing. The Warriors got a stop, then Podziemski — who had his best quarter of the season — drained a three. Horford stole the ball from Jokić, and Podziemski made a mid-range jumper. Melton stole the ball from Braun, and a few seconds later had a transition layup. Just 1:18 after David Adelman had called timeout, he called another one, with the Warriors now leading by seven points.
The second timeout barely did anything, either. On the opening possession, Melton stole the ball from Murray, and then found Horford for yet another three. It capped a 15-0 Golden State run, and gave the Warriors a 10-point lead with just over four minutes remaining. Suddenly the Nuggets look like they had woken up in the middle of basketball game, and had no idea where they were, how they got there, or what they were supposed to do. Based on poise and execution, you wouldn’t be able to guess which team was a championship contender, and which team was missing four of their best players.
It turned into a 20-2 run, as the Dubs pushed the lead to 13 points. Their offense was mostly nonexistent in the final two minutes of the quarter, but their defense smelled blood in the water, and put the clamps on Denver. The Nuggets never got closer than nine, as the Chase Center erupted to celebrate a 128-117 win.
Moody led the scoring with 23 points on 9-for-16 shooting, including 4-for-9 from deep, and added seven rebounds and five assists in one of his better games of the year. Horford was nothing short of sensational, with 22 points on 8-for-11 shooting, including a blistering 6-for-7 from three-point range. Horford only grabbed one rebound, but dished seven assists, while recording three steals and two blocks. Despite drawing the opening assignment against Jokić, Horford didn’t commit a foul all night. Melton also hit the 20-point mark, with 20 points on 7-for-18 shooting, plus four rebounds, two assists, and a whopping four steals (Golden State had 14 on the night).
But the biggest star might have been Podziemski, who nearly had a triple-double. Podz only shot 7-for-16 from the field, but finished with 18 points, a career-high 15 rebounds, nine assists, and one steal. He was dominant all over the court in the fourth quarter, despite entering the frame just 1-for-10 from the field. But he scored 15 of the team’s 33 points in the critical frame, while being a menace on the glass and playing exceptional defense. He helped the Warriors win the bench battle 44-28.
The Warriors overcome a typically superstar performance from Jokić, who had 35 points, 20 rebounds, 12 assists, three steals, and two blocks. Murray added 21 points and Braun 18, but the Warriors forced 13 turnovers out of that star trio. Most importantly, the Nuggets shot just 8-for-31 (25.8%) from three-point range, while the Warriors, despite their cold third quarter, went 21-for-52 (40.4%).
With the win, the Warriors improve to 30-27 on the season. They now hit the road for a back-to-back in the south, visiting the New Orleans Pelicans on Tuesday and the Memphis Grizzlies on Wednesday.