‘Tired’ Nuggets bullied by Wolves, blown out again by Minny

DENVER—For the fifth straight matchup, the Minnesota Timberwolves bullied the Denver Nuggets into a win, taking Wednesday’s game 115-95.

After going up 3-2 on the team from the Twin Cities in the second round of last spring’s playoffs, the Nuggets have suffered their worst playoff loss ever by margin, the NBA’s biggest Game 7 collapse, and now three regular-season losses to the same group during this campaign. Of the trio, there was a blown 12-point lead by Denver and two blowout victories for the Wolves.

“I’m not really sure. Game 1, it went down to the wire,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said, trying to figure out what just happened to his team—crediting not having Aaron Gordon again as an issue. “I liked our chances in that one. Game 2, that game got away from us, kind of like tonight, I think maybe in the third quarter we got it down to five. After that, nothing went our way. So I’m not sure the reasons why.”

This third meeting in 2024-25 had the Nuggets down as much as 26 in the second half as the Wolves just continued to bite into a Nuggets ensemble that struggled to score. Not even Nikola Jokic’s 34 points, eight rebounds and four assists could spark—as similar to Game 7 last season—there was just not enough help. Russell Westbrook was the lone non-Nikola Nugget to hit multiple shots in the first half, and the two combined for all but 10 of Denver’s points before the break. Jamal Murray provided some flash in the third quarter but finished with 12 points on 15 shots. Westbrook had just two points after halftime, scoring 19 on the night. The bench scored just three points before garbage time, characterizing just how rough Denver’s offensive diversity was.

“We were really tired tonight, and I don’t know that back to back in OKC, and the emotions of that, everything you put into that, I just felt that we were a step slow, and that’s understandable,” Malone said after the team’s thrid game in four days—part of five within seven days. “That’s what I was telling myself. Look at what I’m asking, especially our main players as of late. That’s a lot, and so we just have to find a way to give them as much rest as possible heading into this upcoming back-to-back.”

Malone shares that he feels the Nuggets were tired tonight “a step slow” said they put a ton of effort into that OKC back to back and he’s asking a ton of his players right now. pic.twitter.com/VL0s0EtDmP

— Jake Shapiro (@Shapalicious) March 13, 2025

The Nuggets are back with two more games at Ball Arena this weekend—hosting the Lakers and then the Wizards on Friday and Saturday as they conclude a stretch of five games in seven days. The clash with Los Angeles will be a bit muted since LeBron James is expected to miss the contest with a groin injury. We won’t get quite the rematch to last’s month’s Lakers butt kicking but it’s still important as the teams fight for the No. 2 seed in the West. The Wizards are the worst team in basketball with just 13 wins, though one was against the Nuggets.

With the loss to the Wolves, the Nuggets have actually dropped to third in the West.

It’s the team’s 10th home loss this season. Aside for the COVID-impacted campaigns, this is the first Nuggets season with 10 or more home losses since 2019-20, when they had 10. The team had 11 in 2017-18, but you really have to go back to 2016-17’s 19 home losses to find a demonstrably worse year at home for Denver. Speaking of—Denver has now been blowout at home by more than 20 points four times, equalling how many that had happened to Denver in the last half-decade.

“I would never question our guys’ pride. I’ve been with this group for 10 years and for the last five or six with this core,” Malone said. “I would never say that this is a pride thing. Is it disappointing that we’re down 3-0 to them? Is it disappointing that they beat us three times in our home court last year in the playoffs? Yeah, of course, that stings, that hurts, and you know, we got one more crack at him later on this season.”