Aaron Gordon hit a 3-pointer in the closing seconds to score 22 points and lift the Denver Nuggets to a 121-119 road victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 1 of their second-round Western Conference playoff series.
‘I never felt like anybody wavered,’ Nuggets interim coach David Adelman said. ‘That doesn’t mean you’re going to win the game. … In the NBA, playoffs, these games are so long. You’ve got to give yourself a chance.’
With 9.5 seconds remaining and the Thunder up by one, the Nuggets’ Russell Westbrook fouled Chet Holmgren.
Holmgren missed both free throws, giving Denver an opening to finish off the comeback.
Christian Braun grabbed the rebound, fed it to Westbrook, who barreled down the floor before finding Gordon for the game-winning three.
‘(Gordon) is a Denver Nugget, man,’ Adelman said. ‘He is the soul of our team.’
The Nuggets hadn’t led since the first quarter, trailing by as many as 13 in the fourth quarter.
But the Nuggets ended the game with a 19-6 run to knock off the top seed in the Western Conference.
‘I didn’t think our execution was as clean as it can be,’ Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. ‘But we’ll learn from it. It’s a series.’
Nikola Jokic scored 18 of his 42 points in the fourth quarter, hitting a pair of 3-pointers and eight free throws.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 33 points to lead the Thunder, who had not played in nine days.
Oklahoma City didn’t make it easy on Jokic, using several different players to defend him.
Jokic showed frustration multiple times with the way he was being guarded.
With less than seven minutes to play, Jokic elbowed Luguentz Dort in the jaw while Dort was guarding Jokic in the lane.
Dort remained down for several moments, and after a lengthy review, Jokic was called for a Flagrant 1 foul. It was Jokic’s fifth foul of the game.
But Jokic never picked up his sixth, and scored 16 points from that point on to help the Nuggets stay in it for Westbrook and Gordon to team up for the final play.
Jokic also added 22 rebounds, tying his career playoff high.
‘He had some unbelievable finishes around the basket,’ Adelman said.
Westbrook, who was a longtime star with the Thunder, helped keep Denver in it.
With less than five minutes left in the third quarter, Oklahoma City led by 14 points.
But the Nuggets ended the quarter on a 17-8 run to cut the deficit to five before the end of the quarter.
Westbrook scored eight of his 10 third-quarter points during the stretch.
Oklahoma City missed its first 10 3-pointers before Alex Caruso’s 3-pointer early in the second quarter.
Caruso added 20 points for the Thunder, who will host the Nuggets in Game 2 Wednesday, eager to get back in the win column.
‘No one just walks their way through a series at this point in the season,’ Daigneault said.
