Nikola Jokic flicks one-handed highlight in Nuggets' blowout win over Jazz

Luca Evans, The Denver Post on Mar 29, 2025

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DENVER — There was nobody rising to meet the Jazz’s Isaiah Collier in the lane, and nobody rising to contest his kickout to a wide-open Brice Sensabaugh in the corner, and Nuggets head coach Michael Malone had seen enough.

A whistle blew for a timeout, a few minutes into the second quarter Friday night at Ball Arena, after a Sensabaugh triple cut Denver’s lead to four over a Utah team of spare NBA parts and jittery rookies. Malone looked upwards, shaking his head. No answers lay in the rafters.

Spring has become a slog down at Ball. Injuries have thrown Malone’s lineups into a carousel. Defensive rotations have been slow. The Nuggets played down to the short-handed Bucks on Wednesday, and down to the tanking Jazz in Friday’s first half, time ticking menacingly away for Malone’s team to find another gear entering April.

“You don’t have that luxury of, ‘just, okay, let’s turn it on now’ … there is no magic switch,” Malone said, pregame.

Anyone sitting at Ball Arena Friday night for a 129-93 Nuggets win, though, could be convinced there’s enough magic in Nikola Jokic’s fingertips to flip that switch all by his towering self.

It was a sloppy first half for the MVP, all things considered. He flung a couple of passes carelessly. He hung his head after a 3-pointer doinked off the rim. The Nuggets, despite the Jazz starting 0 for 10 from deep, were up just seven with 4.1 seconds left in the first half.

And then Jokic took an inbound, Euro-stepped his way around Jazz guard Collin Sexton, and flicked a one-handed moonbeam 62 feet towards the opposing rim. No shred of effort. As casual as an accountant chucking an unwanted spreadsheet in the trash.

The toss fell, from the same rafters Malone had squinted up at minutes earlier, and swished home so neatly it upturned the net. Ball Arena erupted to its feet. Sexton’s shoulders slouched, deflated. One fan, as Jokic exited the tunnel at the halftime break, bowed two hands to him in sheer reverence.

“When it left your hands,” Malone recounted asking Jokic, after the win, “did you think it was going in?”

“Actually,” Jokic responded, as Malone remembered, “I did.”

It was another highlight in an all-time great campaign overflowing with them, Jokic freewheeling his way to a ho-hum 27 points, 14 rebounds and six assists.

Denver’s defense, struggling mightily since the All-Star break, propped up Jokic’s offensive brilliance the rest of the way, holding Utah to 36% from the floor. Yes, the Jazz had lost 14 of their last 15 in their hunt to capture the Cooper Flagg. Yes, they started three rookies and a center, in Oscar Tshiebwe, who’s played 18 NBA games. But the Nuggets played personnel beautifully — giving Jazz rookie Collier a cushion in an 0-for-7 night, pressing up on sparkplug Keyonte George in a 5-for-17 night — and were buoyed by ascending 6-foot-7 wraith Peyton Watson.

Malone tabbed Watson to start in place of Jamal Murray Friday in a jumbo-sized lineup. His offensive limitations were still apparent, finishing with eight points and missing both of his threes. But his sheer effort gave Utah fits.

He met Sexton at the rim to ward off a layup on one second-quarter possession, then closed out on him so viciously that Sexton stepped out of bounds a few seconds later. He stuffed three Nuggets shots, and sprinted from half court to chase down and foul Utah’s Kyle Filipowski on a second-half breakaway. And Watson soared for three dunks in less than a minute of clock in the third quarter, capping off the sequence with a windmill, roaring to the crowd at Ball as Jazz coach Will Hardy called for a timeout.

“Peyton was our defensive player of the game tonight,” Malone said, postgame. “I felt he did a really nice job for us. He’s playing really good basketball for us right now, and that’s great to see, because he’s an important piece for this franchise, not just this year, but obviously moving forward.”

Michael Porter Jr. added 20 points and a career-high-tying four blocks. Russell Westbrook feasted in the midrange on his way to 17 points. And the Nuggets streaked to a 90-58 run the rest of the way from that second-quarter Malone timeout — switch firmly flipped.