Sports
Nikola Jokic Leads The Denver Nuggets To The NBA Finals For The First Time In Team History – Forbes
Nikola Jokic celebrates after the Denver Nuggets win their first Western Conference title in … [+]
The Denver Nuggets still have plenty of work to do to reach their ultimate goal, but today their fans have a lot to celebrate, as the team reached the NBA Finals for the first time in the 56-year history of the franchise.
In a tightly-contested Western Conference Finals Game 4 featuring a slew of historic NBA and Nuggets records, Denver beat the Los Angeles Lakers, weathering a valiant 40-point effort from LeBron James, and earning the Nuggets their very first conference title – and also in the process, both the team’s first-ever playoff sweep and first win over the Lakers.
“This is for all of our fans back in Denver, who come every night to make Ball Arena just an incredible place to play,” head coach Michael Malone said in his press conference after his team’s second consecutive road win in Los Angeles. “This is a special moment, so we’re going to savor it for a moment, and then get back to work.”
In the win, Denver was led on the court by two-time MVP Nikola Jokic and his co-star Jamal Murray, and from the bench by head coach Michael Malone, all of whom have been instrumental in transforming the Nuggets from a youthful rebuilding project to, now, the 2023 Western Conference Finals champion.
In addition to the team’s milestones, Jokic also made individual history in two big ways.
Jokic became the NBA’s all-time leader in triple-doubles in a single postseason, with 30 points, 14 rebounds, 13 assists, three blocks and a steal, netting his eighth triple-double in these playoffs, and passing the legendary Wilt Chamberlain’s previous record of seven which, like the Nuggets themselves, was established in 1967.
Jokic was also named the NBA’s Western Conference Finals MVP, adding the accolade to a resume which already features two regular season MVP awards.
But zooming out to the big picture beyond the more immediate details of Denver’s series-clinching victory, two outstanding realities loom large.
The first is that this season’s Nuggets squad is now unequivocally and undeniably the most successful incarnation in team history. By reaching the Finals and positioning themselves just four wins away from Denver’s first NBA championship, this team has ascended to a level never reached by previous iterations of the Nuggets led by greats such as Alex English, David Thompson, Dikembe Mutombo or Carmelo Anthony (who somewhat coincidentally announced his official retirement the same day as Denver’s big win). In this sense, the current playoff run culminating in sweeping the Lakers in the WCF represents the team’s greatest accomplishment to date.
But the second, and arguably more important (or at least more urgent) matter is that despite coming so far, the Nuggets still have a long way to go in order to claim their first NBA championship.
“It means a lot,” Malone said postgame, “but I speak for 17 players in that locker room and the entire organization: We are not satisfied… We have a lot of work to do.”
“Whoever we wind up playing, we’ll prepare like we have all playoffs, we’ll have our guys ready,” Malone added. “And it’s also about us doing us.”
To Malone’s point, the Nuggets do not yet know their Finals opponent, with the Eastern Conference Finals still in progress, and the Boston Celtics getting a big win against the Miami Heat the day after Denver’s victory, staving off elimination. Either way, Denver’s focus remains the same.
“Enjoy the moment, but we’ve got more work to do,” Jamal Murray explained, “so that’s the mindset right now.”
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who was on the Lakers when they defeated the Nuggets in their previous WCF matchup in the 2020 NBA bubble on their way to that year’s title, echoed a similar sentiment.
“It is, I still have little butterflies,” he said when asked if his feeling of excitement matched that of his last trip to the Finals. “But I gotta tell my teammates, just enjoy the moment, and then we’ve got four more.”
Just four more wins to the Nuggets’ first championship is a situation their fans have only been able to dream of until this moment. But they have been the best team in the playoffs so far, and if they can carry that momentum through just one more series, they should at long last bring that long-awaited NBA title back to Denver.