The New York Knicks crushed the Denver Nuggets on Monday. Denver's 145-118 loss at Ball Arena was its worst defensive performance of the season -- and New York's best offensive performance -- and it elicited a series of angry postgame comments from coach Michael Malone. Here's a sampling:
- On the idea of "flushing" the loss and moving on: "Nah, f--- that, man. No, no, no. No, no, we're not flushing it. You don't flush when you get embarrassed. You don't flush when you gave up 145 points. You don't flush when you didn't play hard, you didn't play with effort, you didn't play with physicality. I'm not flushing anything."
- On looking to the team's leaders when the game was going poorly: "Russell Westbrook, he's vocal. But we need more than Russell Westbrook. I need Nikola Jokic, I need Jamal Murray, I need guys that have been here in that starting lineup to be vocal. And tonight we got embarrassed...regardless of who's in, who's out, who do we want to be as a team? You know? I mean, so yeah, leadership would be great...Toughness would be great, Physicality would be great. Playing like you actually care would be great. And we didn't do that tonight."
- On the Nuggets' transition defense, which, according to Cleaning The Glass, ranks third-last in the league: "It's been a common theme. We're a great transition offensive team -- weren't tonight, they tripled us in transition points -- but we never run back. We're a one-way running team, and it's been that way all season long. So yes, getting back in transition, you can have all the rules you want in transition, but if you don't sprint back, none of those rules matter. And we come out of the halftime break, their first eight points were layups. So we're just fooling ourselves. We're just fooling ourselves. Yes, they're a good team, but if that's the effort we're going to give forth, we won't even be close to being a playoff team."
A couple of weeks ago, after winning a wild game against the Dallas Mavericks, Denver was 7-3. Then Jokic was away from the team for a week, during which time he welcomed his newborn son. The Nuggets lost to the New Orleans Pelicans and split a pair of games against the Memphis Grizzlies without Jokic, and they've gone 1-2 since he returned: A close loss against Dallas, a blowout win over the Los Angeles Lakers and the debacle against the Knicks, all at home. They're now 9-7 on the season.
Despite this slide, it hasn't been all doom and gloom for Denver. Jokic has again been the best player in the world this season, Westbrook has fit in better than many expected and young wings Christian Braun and Peyton Watson have largely given the team what it needs from them. The roster isn't particularly deep, though, and the Nuggets are feeling the absence of Aaron Gordon, who is out indefinitely with a calf injury. The further they get into the season without Murray's efficiency improving (he's averaging 17.8 points per game while shooting 40.2% from the floor and 33.7% from 3-point range), the more concerning it will be.
It's good news that Denver's next game is against the 4-12 Utah Jazz on Wednesday. The Nuggets can't just show up in Utah and expect to win, though. Two days before demolishing Denver, New York lost by double digits there.
