Nuggets annihilate Thunder 126-96

The Oklahoma City Thunder, having played three games in four days, fell victim to tired legs in a 126-96 loss against the Denver Nuggets.

Now that should not discredit the Nuggets, who solidified their win in the first 12 minutes, annihilating the Thunder.

They should be credited for putting the game away early and not letting up.

The Nuggets have also historically dominated the Thunder in the Nikola Jokic era, and Saturday was no different.

Jokic put up a 19 point, 13 assists, and 11 rebounds for a triple-double. Michael Porter Jr. added 20 points, and Jamal Murray scored 26 points.

Denver did a great job at just defending the Thunder and suffocating them all game long.

They did not allow OKC to score any easy points and limited the Thunder to 11-of-47 (21.8%) from deep. The Thunder shot 41.4% overall as a team.

“They were really sharp, obviously, to start the game,” said head coach Mark Daigneault. “We just didn’t have the attention to detail or energy to stop them.”

After averaging 31 points per game (PPG) on 62.1 FG% in his last four games, SGA finished with a quiet 13 points on 5-of-11 shooting. SGA also had six assists but four turnovers.

“Denver came out, hot, ready to play tonight,” said Mike Muscala, who finished with eight points. “I thought the coach did a good job at calling timeouts there and try to gather us. We can be better, and we’ll learn from that.”

Bazley finished with 22 points.

After a long streak of games of shooting poorly, Bazley has had a nice couple of scoring games.

The Thunder had three other players score at least 10 points. Isaiah Roby, Kenrich Williams, and Ty Jerome.

Roby finished with 15 points, seven assists, and nine rebounds.

The high assist number is negated by the fact that Roby also turned the ball over seven times.

Williams scored 12 points and grabbed five rebounds.

Jerome had a nice second game of the season as he finished with 12 points. Through two games, Jerome has looked fantastic.

Hopefully, he keeps this up and stays relatively healthy.

Overall, this was a sloppy game where nobody outside of Bazley really played great.

This could be because of a mix of tired legs, inferior talent, and a bad matchup against the Nuggets.

On a side note, the NASCAR jerseys are cursed!.

Next Game: The Thunder gets a much earned three days rest and will suit up to play the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday.