Nuggets, Thunder and Nikola Jokić
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Nikola Jokić lived up to his nickname on Friday, arriving at the Ball Arena wearing a Joker-inspired purple and green suit before helping the Denver Nuggets to a dramatic, overtime 113-104 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 3 of their playoff series.
9hon MSN
Nikola Jokić is the best basketball player on the planet, and he was also, importantly, the NBA's best player this season. But he is also almost certainly going to fall short in MVP voting to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander for reasons that were on full display in Game 5.
For the second straight game, the Oklahoma City Thunder erased a fourth-quarter deficit, and once again, they walked away with a win.
In addition to his game-saving defensive plays in the series’ first two contests, Bridges has made up for offensive struggles with averages of 5.3 rebounds, 4.7 assists and 2.7 steals while playing a whopping 44.0 minutes per game.
How Nuggets' Aaron Gordon, Timberwolves' Julius Randle have reinvented themselves to help contenders
Aaron Gordon might be the gold standard of the "struggling leading man to role player" transformation right now. After never finding his place in Orlando, he has become Mr. Nugget in Denver by giving up the on-ball portion of his offensive game,
Even as Paycom Center roared, the Thunder acted like it had been there, done that. And bit by bit, OKC is showing it can have playoff success its way.