The Denver Nuggets have taken a 2-1 lead in the 2023 NBA Finals by defeating the Miami Heat, 109-94, in Game 3 on Wednesday. Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray led the way by becoming the first teammates in NBA history to post 30-point triple-doubles in any game, but it was a team-wide performance as the Nuggets played one of their best defensive games of the postseason.
The Nuggets held the Heat to just 94 points, and aside from Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo, only Caleb Martin even managed to reach double-figures. Now the pressure is squarely on the Heat. If they can't tie this thing up on Friday in Game 4, they'll head back to Denver with the Nuggets just one win away from their first NBA championship. Here are the biggest takeaways from Game 3.
Doing it on defense
As hard as this is to believe, Denver's lone loss in this series was also its best offensive performance. The Nuggets had a strong 124.1 offensive rating in Game 2, but as Michael Malone noted, their defensive effort was sorely lacking. That game is now looking like an outlier, though, because Denver's defense has been stout in its two victories.
The Nuggets have now held the Heat below 100 points in two of the three games thus far in this series. They've held Heat star Jimmy Butler to just 20.7 points per game, and after struggling on the road defensively all season, the Nuggets just played one of their best defensive games of the season in a hostile environment in Miami.
The Nuggets are undeniably built to win on offense. Jokic is the best offensive player in the world, and Jamal Murray and Michael Porter Jr. are both making max money because they score points. But Malone has been trying to build a defensive culture in Denver for years, and while they'll never be elite on that end of the floor, they've clearly reached the point where they are good enough in the right matchups to survive. In this series, they've thrived. Right now, the Nuggets are winning the championship on defense.
Denver looks deeper than Miami right now
Denver got almost nothing out of most of its bench all season. Whenever Jokic left games, the Nuggets got destroyed, and even at their best in the playoffs, Malone only really trusted Bruce Brown to play big minutes off the bench. Miami, meanwhile, has cycled through reserves comfortably all postseason. They reached the Finals without third-leading scorer Tyler Herro. They're turning undrafted free agents into major contributors. Depth has never been a concern in Miami. It's been the No. 1 concern in Denver all season.
But right now, the tables might be turning. Jeff Green has been reliable for Denver all postseason, and now, Christian Braun has emerged as one of the breakout players of the Finals. With 15 points in Game 3, he was essential to breaking Miami's zone defense by both cutting off of the ball and driving against closeouts when he had it. His energy on defense has given Miami fits, and he has four steals thus far in the Finals.
The Heat aren't so lucky. They don't trust Duncan Robinson defensively in this matchup, and Kyle Lowry was clearly in pain as he left Game 3 late in the fourth quarter. Miami doesn't have an alternative for Lowry at this point. He played 30 minutes in Game 3 and is essential as an offensive engine for a team that lacks shot-creation. If he is hurt, Miami needs Herro back on the floor as quickly as possible. Otherwise, the Heat might simply be out of usable players.
Star-making performances
Jamal Murray has had plenty of superstar performances in the postseason, with his decimation of the Utah Jazz in 2020 standing out as the best. Nikola Jokic has had even more of them just by virtue of his health. But the two of them have never had a signature game at the same time... until now. In Game 3, Jokic and Murray became the first pair of teammates in any NBA game to post 30-point triple-doubles, and they did it in the NBA Finals.
Murray often gets overlooked as Jokic's sidekick, but the truth is that Denver relies on the synergy between the two of them to reach the offensive heights we've seen this season. They have the most diverse pick-and-roll game of any two players in the NBA, with either comfortable serving as the ball-handler or the screener and running the offense by reacting to whatever the defense throws at the two of them. Murray's speed complements Jokic's size, yet Murray can also play bully ball while Jokic has as much finesse as any guard.
Whether they are the best set of two teammates in the NBA is debatable, but they are undeniably the duo that does the most amplify one another. Jokic and Murray, together, are about as complete an offensive pairing as the NBA has ever seen, and it therefore seems fitting that as they come closer and closer to their first championship, they'd do it by making history together.