“It’s just impossible: “Nikola Jokić’s 55-point game?” The best player in the world is having a season like no other, never seen before
Nikola Jokić entered action Wednesday leading the NBA in assists and points created off assists, creating more field goals for his Denver Nuggets teammates than any other facilitator in the NBA. Knowing the danger of trying to force the ball out of the big guy’s hands, only to see one of his running mates calmly deposit it into the basket, LA Clippers coach Tyronn Lue chose to employ a strategy that a number of other opponents have tried in the past.
“Our game plan was to let him score — just take away his passes, take everyone else out of the game,” Lue said afterward.
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As counterintuitive as it may seem, there is logic to this: Over the course of Jokić’s career, the Nuggets had gone 186-63 (.747 winning percentage) when he dished out 10 or more assists, compared to 22-15 (.594) when he scored 40 or more points. And, in a way, Lue’s tactic worked. No other Nugget scored more than 18 points, with Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon and Co. combining to shoot 26 of 61 (42.6%) from the field and 8 of 28 (28.6%) from 3-point range; Jokić finished with just six assists, his season low.
Unfortunately for Lue, the problem with Jokić is that even when you solve one problem, you have to deal with another.
“You know, I didn’t think he was going to score 55,” Lue added.
Weeeeeeee…
On the second night of a back-to-back road trip, after posting 35-15-7 with as many missed shots as turnovers (three) in a dominant win over the Kings, Jokić actually missed three of his first four attempts against the Clips: a left-handed layup in traffic after diving at the rim of the pick-and-roll, a 6-foot shot after an offensive rebound and a wide-open catch-and-shoot 3. the rest of the quarter, uncorking a 25-point lightning bolt in the opening frame.
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Jokić had 33 at halftime, cutting the Clippers’ double-digit lead to five heading into the locker room. He then took the lead and made his first seven shots out of halftime, a 19-point burst that tilted the game firmly in Denver’s favor.
After scoring 52 points on 22 shots in 31 minutes through three quarters, Jokić would return to the court midway through the quarter with the Nuggets leading by 19 — a decision that Denver coach David Adelman defended by only seeking to salt the victory against an opponent capable of heating up from long range. Six minutes later, the 130-116 victory was secured; another rebound and a free throw later, Jokić finished with 55 points – tying MVP fighter Shai Gilgeous-Alexander for the NBA single-game season record – on 18-of-23 shooting, 12 rebounds, 6 assists, 1 steal, 1 block and 2 turnovers in 34 minutes of work.
Jokić went 8 of 10 at the rim, 5 of 7 from mid-range, 5 of 6 from 3-point range and 14 of 16 from the free throw line. He tortured Ivica Zubac and Brook Lopez by escaping blocked screens, leaping to the 3-point arc after setting an on-ball and face-up screen in the midrange. When he picked up a smaller defender, he immediately took him to the weight room in the low post. When he drew a double, he played it calmly, creating incredible looks for his teammates.
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“They ran a lot of defensive schemes,” Gordon told reporters. “None of them worked. I mean, they were Kitchen this evening.”
And cooking at a level that not even the NBA’s leading point producer had ever reached before. According to Game Score, a statistic developed to offer a “rough measure of a player’s productivity for a single game” (think rating a player’s efficiency in a single game), what Jokić had against the Clippers on Wednesday was his best individual game of the season. More: it was his most productive performance – regular season or playoffs – never.
“It was extraordinary,” Adelman told reporters. “This is one of those performances you won’t forget.”
It seems almost impossible: the idea that, at this stage, with three MVP awards and seven straight All-NBA selections, we might be seeing the best version of Nikola Jokić there ever was.
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And yet:
Jokić is now averaging 28.8 points per game, behind only Luka Dončić, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Gilgeous-Alexander, Tyrese Maxey and Donovan Mitchell among players who have played at least five games. Last season he scored more on average, but in almost three more minutes per game; considering the minutes and possessions, Jokić has never scored so much, especially thanks to a frankly incredible performance. 78.3% field goal percentage on 2-point shots.
The only players in Stathead’s database to make three-quarters of their attempts inside the arc in a season are Mitchell Robinson, DeAndre Jordan, Jaxson Hayes and Gary Payton II. All made fewer than five 2-point shots per game. Jokić is taking nearly 12, taking them from a significantly wider mid-range, and doing so against game plans aimed specifically at stopping him… and he’s still reducing everything to rubble. His touch — on half-hooks from the post, on rebounds around the basket, on floaters, on runners, on mid-range turnarounds, on those infuriating defender Sombor Shuffles — is unlike anything we’ve ever seen; it’s as if each of his fingertips has its own brain, its own central nervous system, its own ability to induce the edge to give As soon as enough to guide the ball to its intended destination.
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Jokić combines that touch with the unstoppable size and strength that allows him to push any defender forward, the quickness to run on the break to create an easy opening attack, and a 3-point shot that has seen him sink more than 40 percent of his 3-pointers in each of the last two seasons.
“When Joker hits 3, he’s just impossible to protect,” Gordon said recently. “It’s already impossible to protect him.”
Add all this up and you have a recipe for unprecedented scoring efficiency. Namely:
Oh, also:
He leads the league in rebounds and assists per game, something no one had ever done before for an entire season (Wilt led the NBA in total assists in 1967-68, but Oscar Robertson averaged more per night);
Jokić’s touches, time of possession and usage rate are all declining, year after year. The same goes for his post-ups, with Adelman saying that “if we can get through games without having to post it 25 times, I think it’s beneficial for us and for his body.”
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Having Jokić slide more frequently from the block to the elbows or top of the key is working well for the Nuggets’ overall offensive ecosystem, too, since positioning him up there lifts his defender out of the box, creating all kinds of space for split plays, dribble passes, and backdoor cuts. Denver ranks second in the NBA in possession per game, according to Synergy, and is scoring 1.39 points per possession, tied for the fifth-best possessions in the league.
With Jokić leading this block/cut/move-heavy offense, and with Denver’s guards and wings eagerly feasting on the scoring opportunities they get simply by playing opportunistically using the attention Jokić demands, scoring efficiency is through the roof for a Nuggets offense that ranks first in the NBA, according to Cleaning the Glass. They’re scoring an obscene 131.3 points per 100 non-garbage possessions with the big guy on the floor — miles and miles above what the best offenses of all time have produced — and it looks like they haven’t quite gotten going yet. Christian Braun and newcomer Cam Johnson both shoot 21% from 3-point range; expect these numbers to increase if they continue to eat a steady diet with this type of appearance.
It seems reasonable to expect that they, and the rest of the Nuggets, will continue to look like this, too, because Jokić will continue to create them. Get more defenders on the ball and he will feed them high percentage shots. Play him and you’ll get roasted, to the point where you start getting more defenders on the ball… and then he’ll start spoon-feeding them again. It’s a vicious cycle, with no easy answers.
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“This is different,” Nuggets guard Bruce Brown told reporters after Wednesday’s masterclass. “They need to send a double or something. Letting him play 1-on-1, I don’t think that’s the answer. … He’s the best player in the world, so I don’t know what to do with him.”
That’s right, Bruce: When the best player in the world, who said he felt he was playing the best basketball of his life eight months ago, suddenly looks Also Better? It might not be there To be nothing to do with him.
“To me, in this modern generation of basketball, please show me who else is out there that plays like this at this efficient offensive level,” Adelman told reporters. “It’s a joy to watch.”
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And a nightmare to game plan against. Just ask Ty Lue.