Bennett Durando is the Denver Nuggets beat writer for The Denver Post. Before moving to Colorado, where he started as The Post's Avalanche beat writer, he covered SEC football, basketball and other sports for five years: first reporting on his alma mater, Missouri, for the St.
Peyton Watson of the Denver Nuggets reacts to making a 3-pointer over LeBron James of the Los Angeles Lakers during the second quarter at Ball Arena in Denver on Tuesday, January 20, 2026. Bone bruises and muscle strains have threatened to derail the Nuggets’ trajectory after a promising start.
Somehow, they’ve managed to stand firm as a top-three team in the Western Conference, Denver’s record without the injured Jokic was 8-5 going into a pair of games at Milwaukee and Memphis this weekend. Here are five stats and trends that have defined a bizarre, memorable, exhausting month.Murray became the focal point of every opponent’s scouting report with Jokic out of the lineup. Tested by double-teams more than ever, the 28-year-old point guard cemented his All-Star candidacy by striking a near-perfect balance between his responsibilities as a primary scorer and willing facilitator. He’s top-five in the NBA in assists per game since Dec. 30, and his assist-to-turnover ratio is 3.23 — even cleaner than his already impressive 3.04 ratio in the first 31 games of the season, when he had Jokic at his side. All month, David Adelman has repeatedly stressed the importance of simply getting a shot to the rim every possession — make or miss. The Nuggets, he pointed out early on, can’t afford to give away easy points off turnovers while they’re already disadvantaged. After they won in Toronto despite shooting a gnarly 28% from the field after halftime, he was steadfast: “But we shot it,” he said. “And if you shoot it, you’re not turning it over.” Murray has carried out that philosophy by making shots in single-coverage isolation, incentivizing defenses to load up on him, taking care of the ball and unwaveringly finding the open man. Entering a three-game road trip this week, Denver ranked 21st in the league in field goal percentage since Jokic’s injury — but best in turnovers per game with 10.9. “We haven’t created second possessions, but I do think we’ve made the game feel short, in a way, for the opponent,” Adelman said. “So if we just value the possessions, value the shots we take and just be responsible at getting back and playing defense properly, I think you can stay in a lot of games that way in this league.”“It’s a hard adjustment, going from being the sixth or seventh man off the bench, right, to being the second option,” Peyton Watson told The Denver Post in early January. “That’s something that I’m adjusting to. And I’ve done really well at a lot of things, and there are some areas where I need to improve.” Clear-eyed about the imperfections in his game that an increased role would reveal, undeterred by occasional mistakes as a ball-handler, Watson has wielded opportunism and confidence as the ultimate weapons this month. This was an opportunity not just to showcase, but to experiment. The Nuggets have been better off for it. The fourth-year wing is averaging 23.1 points in Jokic’s absence, shooting 52.9% from 2-point range, 45.7% from 3-point range and 73.4% on 6.1 free-throw attempts per game. Watson’s slashing has been a crucial element of Denver’s stylistic pivot this month, with drive-and-kick offense becoming a necessity more often. “It’s not perfect. It’s a growing process for him. But he’s done such a good job of it. And there’s been a maturity to how he’s playing,” Adelman said on the road. “So I don’t look at all the scoring numbers. He’s on a heater right now. So it’s not the shooting for me, even though that is a great improvement. It’s the play-making.”It hasn’t all been smooth sailing for this version of the Nuggets, of course. Perhaps the most underrated subplot to Jokic’s injury has been the fact that they also lost Jonas Valanciunas one game later. He would have been averaging more than 30 minutes per game in Jokic’s place if he had been healthy this month. Instead, it’s been a patchwork rotation of “centers” with nobody else on the roster taller than 6-foot-10. DaRon Holmes II, Zeke Nnaji and Aaron Gordon have each contributed in other ways, but the Nuggets were out-rebounded by an average of 11.5 over 11 games without both of their traditional centers. They were last in rebounding rate during that time , 28th in second-chance points allowed and 29th in second-chance points scored for a league-worst margin of 8.1. They were also last in paint points per game and 26th in paint points allowed . Basically, they’ve been severely disadvantaged in every area you would have predicted them to be at the beginning of this stretch, amounting to a minus-3.6 net rating.That Denver still went 6-5 in those 11 games? Call it an unlikely success. The margin for error in any game becomes razor-thin when you go in knowing your opponent will almost automatically dominate around the rim. You have to find other, creative ways to reach the finish line. The Nuggets have often done it by getting to the fourth quarter in one piece, then holding on for dear life. Seven of their first 13 Jokic-less games involved clutch time . They went 6-1 in the clutch games; 2-5 in the others. Essentially, their results have consisted of blowout losses and nail-biting wins. There was no other way, right? The most noteworthy number here is the clutch defensive rating: 89.6 in 34 minutes. The Nuggets are very much not a good defensive team, but they’ve leaned on timely stops — and maybe some shooting luck — to stay above water. Theirlast week was a show-stopper, highlighted by game-saving blocks from Watson and Nnaji on a pair of 3-point attempts. Adelman has also tailored certain closing lineups to prioritize defense, like when he went to a switchable unit to pull out a gritty win at Boston.Jonas Valanciunas is back for Nuggets on limited minutes. Nobody is happier than Aaron Gordon.others playing restricted minutes , burnout has been on Adelman’s mind. Murray and Watson are both averaging over 36 minutes since Jokic’s injury, ranking top-12 in the league. Tim Hardaway Jr. is averaging 30 off the bench, making Adelman wary that he’s overworking the veteran. Others who were unaccustomed to NBA playing time have been forced to adapt on the fly. “Exasperated” was the word Adelman used this week to describe his locker room amid the relentless schedule and physical workload. That’s why he pulled the plug early on a loss to Charlotte last weekend, and why the Nuggets built in a game earlier this month to rest almost everybody. (Ironically, As Jokic and company begin to trickle back into the lineup, can the Nuggets find more respite for the players who’ve helped carry them through January? A much-needed All-Star break is on the horizon for them now, 10 games away as of Sunday.ICE investigates after Colorado group says agents left 'death cards' in arrested immigrants' abandoned cars'Serial sexual predator' Jay Bianchi sentenced following 2025 convictionsBroncos RB J.K. Dobbins will not play in AFC Championship Game vs. PatriotsColorado weather: Denver, Eastern Plains brace for frigid cold as snow is headed to mountains
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