DENVER — Emotions were running high in the minutes following Russell Westbrook‘s game-winning 36-foot three-pointer on Sunday that ended Denver’s season and playoff hopes and officially sent coach Michael Malone and general manager Tim Connelly into offseason mode.
When reflecting back on the season, there’s a lot of blame to go around for Denver’s failure to hold onto their lead for the eighth seed in the West, something that was theirs for much of the second half of the year.
You can look to the Nuggets’ youth and the fact that Denver relied on a young backcourt and center in Nikola Jokic mixed in with a veteran rotation to get them to the playoffs.