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(Denver-CO) Please forgive me for the late recap of the embarrassing loss to the Timberwolves. My initial intent was to allow the game to settle as to not give a lambasting, knee-jerk reaction and things just got hectic for me yesterday. Hopefully, with my apology excepted, you will read the following thoughts and they can soothe your pain like fresh aloe on a blistering sunburn.
The Denver Nuggets played one solid half of basketball against the Timberwolves. I'll give them that much, but the second half was pretty much everything that drives me crazy about this team magnified about 100x.
'Melo picked up right where he left off after scoring a career-high 50 points against the Knicks by scoring 19 points in the first quarter against the Timberwolves. Anthony was 7-11 from the field, 3-3 from the stripe, and buried 2-4 from distance as the Nuggets, with Kenyon Martin's eleven points, pasted Minnesota with a 40-point offering in the first. It was additionally pleasing to see the starters share the ball so fluidly. Denver handed out a dozen assists in the first twelve minutes with eleven of those coming from the first five.
I didn't expect 'Melo to keep up the kind of scoring pace he came out with, but then again I didn't expect him to completely disappear in the second quarter either. However, that's exactly what happened. Perhaps he was gassed after scoring 50 the previous game and dropping another 19 in the first, but Carmelo played only three scoreless minutes in the second quarter and the Nugget offense looked out of sync without him. And had it not been for the bench coming up with 15 points in the quarter I'm not sure Denver wouldn't have completely collapsed earlier then they did.
Denver lost the second quarter, 25-24, but outscoring the Twolves, 40-25, in the first put them ahead at the half by 14 points.
Then in the third quarter the wheels fell off.
The Nuggets decided they didn't need to share the ball anymore after handing out 19 beautiful assists in the first half, everyone was taking lazy jump shots, and nobody played much defense. All of which comes as no surprise to me because, as I've detailed time and time again, this team, and basketball teams overall, always translate energy on one end of the floor onto the other rarely ever playing great on one end and poorly on the other.
So, after shooting 52% from the field in the first half the Nuggets were 4-20 in the third quarter and handed out a paltry two assists for what I would describe as an effortless twelve points. Need more proof as to how bad the Nuggets' shot selection was as a result of how anemic their offense became? Their closest made field goal in the quarter was a ten-foot jumper. Yeah, things were that bad...
The dominos started to really pick up speed for the Timberwolves offensively as the Nuggets didn't make them expend much energy defensively too. The Wolves shot 14-25 from the field in the quarter, including seven lay-ups, on their way to outscoring the Nuggets by 19 points in the third quarter overall.
Disheveled, disorganized, and down right disrespectful to the fundamental principles we all know George Karl stresses being the good coach from North Carolina that he is. The Nuggets mustered up a half hearted effort in the fourth quarter to come back from such a dismal display in the third, but their lack of any effort to play the game correctly in the third quarter set the tone for the Minnesota Timberwolves, a team that hadn't won since opening night, to believe they could beat Denver on their home floor and that's exactly what they did, 106-100.
Now, I know I've made it sound pretty bad, but the key thing to remember is that this is just one game. Just like the Laker thumping or the Clipper let down it's just one game. But, with that being said, what bothers me the most about this team is their propensity to think they do not have to play the game correctly, for a full game, and still think that a win is just owed to them whether it's because they are playing a poor team or because a team is injury riddled (as was the case with the Clippers). So, the biggest thing to take from this game from the player's perspective is the reassurance that the other team is a group of professionals that can win, against anybody in the league, if the opportunity is given to them. This goes for teams like the Clippers, Wolves, or the Golden State Warriors tonight. On the other side of the blade though... I still believe this Nuggets team can beat anyone on any night in any arena if they decide they want to play together as a team and the fundamentally correct way.
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