Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets saw their five-game undefeated streak painfully come to an end on Sunday, as Kyrie Irving went full Kyrie Irving to deliver the victory for the Dallas Mavericks.
With the game tied at 105-105, Irvin got the inbound pass from the sidelines and attracted the attention of Jokic, who gave the guard a chase. But despite Jokic’s tremendous effort to keep up with the Mavericks star guard and even with his arm all stretched out in an attempt to stop the shot, Irving still buried a left-handed, hook-shot-looking attempt to give Dallas a 107-105 victory at home over the reigning NBA champions.
Nuggets’ Nikola Jokic reacts to Kyrie Irving’s game-winner
“Yeah, it was the same action that they have run before in the game, with the continuation of Kyrie coming from the corner. I mean Kyrie made a really tough shot,” Jokic said after the game (h/t Grant Afseth of DallasBasketball.com).
“If anyone could make that shot, it was him. I was surprised, but also kind of not. He can make that shot for sure.”
Had it been another player who had the ball for the Mavericks in that final possession, Jokic probably would have been more successful on defense. But Kyrie Irving is simply an ultra-talented player on offense with a seemingly endless array of moves in his arsenal. Irving concluded the matchup with 24 points, seven rebounds, and nine assists to go with three steals and a block while going 9-for-23 from the field and 4-for-11 from 3-point distance.
But the Nuggets also might have escaped Dallas with a victory and their win streak intact if Nikola Jokic had a much better outing. The two-time league Most Valuable Player doesn’t always struggle with efficiency on offense, but against the Mavs, he went just 6-for-16 from the floor for 16 points in 39 minutes.
Jamal Murray led the Nuggets with 23 points, while Michael Porter Jr. chipped in 20 points for the Nuggets, whose loss to the Mavs sent them sliding down to second place in the Western Conference standings with a 47-21 record. That also meant the Oklahoma City Thunder are the sole owners of the top spot in the West (just 0.5 games ahead of the Nuggets) at the time of this writing.
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