MINNEAPOLIS • The gestures mentioned all of it.
After Nikola Jokic led the Nuggets to a 120-111 win over Minnesota with a 20-point, 11-rebound, 12-assist triple-double, Denver coach Michael Malone made a circle together with his proper hand and positioned it over his eye, signifying the variety of free throws Nikola Jokic wanted to report the seventh playoff triple-double of his profession.
“It was an impressive effort all the way in which round. Nikola had his seventh profession playoff triple-double, and what’s much more excellent about that … (is he did it) with zero free throw makes an attempt. Zero,” Malone mentioned postgame.
“Nikola’s greatness was on full show.”
The back-to-back Most Helpful Participant helped the Nuggets maintain on whereas the Timberwolves used the momentum supplied by the house crowd to get off to a sizzling begin. After Jokic scored the sport’s opening bucket with a child hook over Rudy Gobert, the Timberwolves scored 10 of the following 12 factors, forcing Malone into an early timeout. The Timberwolves took their greatest lead of the sport, seven factors, a couple of minutes later earlier than Jokic dished out the primary of his assists. Jokic’s 11 first-quarter factors helped the Nuggets begin the second tied with the Timberwolves. He didn’t rating within the second quarter however dished out 4 extra assists, serving to the Nuggets lead by six at halftime.
“We wanted to win, I feel. We didn’t wish to give them life, if that makes any sense. We needed to be the aggressor. We needed to punch them first. They wanted to react to us, that was our plan, and I feel we did job. After all, we anticipated them to be aggressive and play actually good,” Jokic mentioned.
“They had been attacking the paint. They’d the 35 free throw makes an attempt. They had been simply attacking, attacking, and that was their plan. We sort of knew it.”
Minnesota hung tight all through a lot of the second half when Jokic began gesturing. After a bodily possession inside, Jokic ran again down the courtroom slapping his arms and midsection in an try to attract consideration to what he believed was a foul. He mentioned he left it at that.
“If one thing is apparent, I similar to to say it’s apparent,” Jokic mentioned.
The Nuggets received and moved inside a sport of the second spherical regardless of Jokic turning into one among a handful of NBA gamers to report a postseason triple-double with out making an attempt a free throw. The Timberwolves as an entire took 35 free throws to Denver’s 13. Six of the Nuggets’ free throws got here within the last 5 minutes.
Jokic credited Minnesota’s variety of free throws to their aggressive method. He expects the identical exhibiting Sunday with the Timberwolves getting ready to elimination. Whereas just a few free throws would possibly assist, Jokic appears fairly snug with the way in which issues stand heading into Sunday’s Sport 4.
“Identical as right now. They’re going to go aggressive. We have to be extra aggressive. We have to dictate the sport. We all know what to do, so it’s not stress on us to win the sport,” Jokic mentioned.
“We all know what to do, and we’re going to try this.”