You never want to have your manhood questioned but Nuggets Coach Michael Malone continued to challenge his players, unsuccessfully to play harder in Game 4, and it never materialized, as they were run out of the gym in Portland 115-95. It was the Norman Powell show as the Blazers forward scored a game high 29. Denver never really got going, and their best player, the league's likely MVP, Nikola Jokic, along with the other 4 starters had bad night all around, as their head coach pointed out plenty in postgame.
Denver as a team shot a dismal 34 percent from the floor, and was 13-of-44 from 3-point land, which equates to 29.5 percent. Malone said postgame that everything he was saying to the media, he said to the players on the court, and you could see his visible frustration. "I’m just stating facts," Malone said. "When you tell somebody they’re not playing hard enough, or not physical, or we played soft…you hope when you show them the film, they see they didn’t play hard enough, they didn’t play with the requisite effort."
Damian Lillard had what Malone chalked up to as an "off-night" and even though they played him plenty of attention, they wouldn't have anticipated that the 6-time all-star would make just 1 of the 10 shots he took, and Portland would still win by 20.
Jokic led his team in scoring with 16, and 9 rebounds, but for the second time in the playoffs, just 1 assist. Michael Porter Jr., Denver's second-leading scorer took just 3 shots, all from behind-the-arc and made just 1 to finish with 3 points. Reserve Forward JaMychal Green said postgame that he credited the Blazer's for making MPJ's day difficult but didn't seem overly concerned about him getting back on track. "Mike gonna look for his shots, that’s not the problem," Green said. "They just got him out of rhythm. Playing very aggressive, they just made it hard for him tonight. He’s just gotta pick and choose his spots and get going."
The Nuggets now return home for Game 5 Tuesday. "they are saying the same thing in their locker room," Jokic said, "it’s Best of 3, that’s the truth. The next game is gonna be really important of course. Whenever we play a playoff, it’s always a tough series…we always have a long series…we’ve been here before…"
Malone shared postgame that he found out that his team's, despite being a higher seed several times in the playoffs, have never led a series 2-games-to-1. But is playing from behind or with your backs against the wall the safest place to be, "as evidenced by our performance tonight, we’re much more comfortable coming from behind than playing with a lead, and that’s a dangerous place to be," Malone stressed, "the bottom line is, series is tied 2-2, we need to come back home in front of our home crowd at Ball Arena and simply play better."