Jamal Murray sank a 15-foot step-back jumper at the buzzer and the Denver Nuggets cleaned out a 20-point second-half deficit to stun the Los Angeles Lakers 101-99 Monday night and take a 2-0 lead in their Western Conference playoff series.
Murray’s fadeaway, falling-down game-winner offered the Nuggets with their veryfirst lead giventhat 5-3 in the opening minutes and provided the ruling NBA champs their 10th successive win over the Lakers.
The series shifts to Los Angeles for Game 3 Thursday night.
Murray’s winning shot came after LeBron James misfired from long variety with 16 seconds left and the videogame connected at 99.
Michael Porter Jr. got the rebound with 13 seconds left and the Nuggets didn’t call a timeout.
Instead, Murray took the ball to the right side with Anthony Davis protecting him, stepped back and swished the basket simply as the buzzer sounded. Both Murray and Davis fell into the Nuggets’ bench as the sellout crowd’s holler shook Ball Arena.
Murray endedup with 20 points, consistingof 14 in the 4th quarter, and Nikola Jokic published a triple-double with 27 points, 20 boards and 10 helps. Porter included 22 points and Aaron Gordon 14 for Denver.
Davis led the Lakers with 32 points, James had 26 and D’Angelo Russell included 23 with a profession playoff-high 7 3s.
The Lakers led 59-44 at halftime and extended their benefit to 68-48 2 minutes into the 2nd half, and it sure looked like L.A. would beat Denver for the veryfirst time in 494 days. They still led by 10 gettingin the 4th quarter.
“I wear’t have a 20-point play,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone stated. “You’ve got to simply keep breaking away.”
That, they did, lastly connecting it at 95-all on Porter’s 3-tip with 1: 15 left.
Russell’s mostsignificant basket was his layup that offered L.A. a 97-95 lead with a minute to go. Murray was fouled by James and sank both totallyfree tosses to tie it onceagain.
James reacted with a layup for L.A. with 48 seconds left however Murray matched him onceagain with a step-back jumper at 30 seconds. Then, James missedouton from long variety, Porter confined the rebound and the Nuggets were on their method to one of the mostsignificant shots in franchise history.
Murray, who began out 3 of 16, went 6-for-8 in the 4th quarter.
Russell sank three 3s in the opening minutes, matching the number of 3-tips he had in the Lakers’ last 5 playoff videogames versus Denver. He made simply one of his 9 3s in the series opener after going 2-for-15 in the Western Conference finals last summertime, which led to his benching in Game 4. He endedup 7 of 11.
Reporting by The Associated Press.
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