Murray not worried following 1-3 road trip
Worried? Jamal Murray wouldn’t entertain the thought.
In the wake of Wednesday’s demoralizing loss to the lowly Wizards, Murray erupted for a career-high 50 points against Cleveland on Friday night.
On Sunday night, the Nuggets (16-14) suffered another perplexing loss at Atlanta, which included allowing 37 points in the second quarter. If there is a silver-lining to the COVID-crunched schedule, it’s that the unrelenting games haven’t allowed time to dwell.
And rather than belabor the defensive lapses — and there were many, as the Nuggets allowed Trae Young to get loose for 35 points and 15 assists — Murray took the big-picture ap-
proach while jousting with reporters over Zoom after the game.
“Some days you lose, some days you win,” Murray began. “Some days you miss shots, some days you make every shot. Some days one team plays better than you when you know you’re a better team. Some days it’s the other way around. … It’s a long season. We’re not stressing.
“You guys know we can beat the teams we need to beat. You guys know we’ll be in the playoffs. Doesn’t matter who we’re playing. We’ll give it our best shot. The mood is just to get healthy.”
On Sunday, the Nuggets were without Gary Harris (adductor), JaMychal Green (shoulder), Paul Millsap (knee) and PJ Dozier (hamstring). That thrust rookie Zeke Nnaji into a starting role against the Hawks’ bouncy frontcourt.
When Michael Porter Jr. got in early foul trouble, Nuggets coach Michael Malone resorted to Bol Bol, who hadn’t played meaningful minutes in weeks.
The second unit so far has been a rotating cast of characters, most of whom weren’t even on the Nuggets last season.
“We got a lot of bodies out,” Murray said. “You guys don’t take that into consideration sometimes. We got a lot of guys out. We have Thrill (Barton) playing the four. Bol hasn’t played all season, getting in there and doing a great job. Sometimes it’s a chemistry thing.”
Murray’s point was valid. There can’t be the same expectations cast upon Nnaji and Bol as there are upon Green and Millsap, two playoff-tested veterans.
And Murray was right in another regard, too. When the Nuggets falter against teams with worse records — Washington, Sacramento (twice) — it’s almost always because their defense betrays them.
“I never think it’s our offense,” Murray said. “… Make other teams have to think about the shots they’re taking. … We gotta worry about our defense and let that fuel our offense.”
The Hawks converted 13 turnovers into 20 points on Sunday night.
In the three games (1-2) leading into the Atlanta game, opponents were averaging 23.3 points off Denver turnovers — the fifthworst rate in the NBA. So while Denver’s offense is always potent, it’s also their carelessness with the ball that’s yielded easy scoring chances.
It was on that last point that Murray chose to banter with The Denver Post.
“What you think, Mike?” Murray asked. “You’re writing the stories. I’m just asking a simple question.”
After suggesting that the team has a tendency to beat themselves, Murray agreed.
“Everything you said is right, man,” he said. “… We beat ourselves. We give ourselves a chance until we don’t give ourselves a chance. … We’ve got a young team trying to step into a big role.”
But then, as is customary, Murray relayed a confidence that’s never wavered.
“We’ll be all right, man,” he said.
“I love our squad.”
The Pac-12 Conference on Monday finally filled in the final pieces of its 2020-21 men’s basketball schedule.
For Colorado, it indeed will be a complete picture, as the longawaited makeup date against Arizona State will be played Thursday, March 4, at the CU Events Center. For others, including two of the teams the Buffs have a slim but hardly impossible chance of tracking down in the Pac-12 standings — UCLA and Oregon — the final ledger will fall short of the 20-game league slate the Pac-12 scheduled for the first time this year.
If the games commence as planned, the Buffs will complete the regular season with a threegame homestand, culminating with the Senior Day festivities next week against Arizona State. The tipoff time has not yet been determined, and the game will air on either ESPN2 or ESPNU.
Mathematically, the Buffs still have a shot at the top seed for the conference tournament in Las Vegas, if they can win out during a homestand that begins Thursday night against No. 19 USC (7 p.m., ESPN TBD). Yet the Buffs still will require further help, and given one of the games that apparently will not happen is Oregon’s visit to UCLA, there might not be enough help available.
CU (11-6 Pac-12) begins the week three games behind Oregon (9-3), USC (12-3), and UCLA (12-3) in the loss column, but will inch closer to one of those teams after the Ducks and USC square off Monday night in Los Angeles. If Oregon wins Monday and the Buffs sweep the Los Angeles schools, CU will be only one loss behind the Trojans (and a season sweep in hand) with USC completing its schedule at Utah, against Stanford at home, and at UCLA. In that scenario, if USC then topped the Bruins, the Buffs would only be one loss behind UCLA with the Bruins also now facing a visit to Oregon (March 3).
The Ducks might be more difficult to catch, if only because they are scheduled to finish with just an 18-game conference schedule. Monday’s game at USC begins a demanding final two weeks for Oregon, which now is slated to play six games in 14 days ahead of the conference tournament, but will not have to host Arizona State, or visit UCLA. The Bruins are now looking at a 19-game conference schedule.
For the Buffs, the March 4 date against ASU splits the layoff time between Saturday’s game against UCLA and their first game in the Pac-12 tournament, which likely will be in the quarterfinals on March 11. With the league awarding five firstround byes in the tournament this year instead of the usual four after Arizona self-imposed a postseason ban, CU will be assured of its first first-round bye at the tournament with one more win, though even with three losses it would take an unlikely series of events for the Buffs to be surpassed for the fifth seed.
“This is a time of year where you’ve got guys that are banged up and bruised up. But it’s also a time of year when guys want to play,” CU head coach Tad Boyle said. “You find that balance of not playing too many games, but playing enough to keep you sharp. We’ll use the time wisely in terms of our time off, if we have it, to get rest and get our bodies healed up but yet stay sharp.”