Bennett Durando is the Colorado Avalanche beat writer for The Denver Post. Before taking on his first NHL beat, he covered SEC football and other sports for five years, first at his alma mater, Missouri, for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and Columbia Missourian, then Auburn for the Montgomery Advertiser.
Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic drives against Oklahoma City Thunder forward Chet Holmgren in the first half of an NBA basketball game, Sunday, Oct. 29, 2023, in Oklahoma City. OKLAHOMA CITY — Armed with another compelling rookie whose debut was a year in the making, the Thunder had extra reason to be inspired Sunday for the 2023-24 home opener. It took two possessions for Chet Holmgren to receive a humbling jolt and for a booming crowd to lose its edge.
Jokic bounced back from a nine-turnover outing Friday in Memphis, where the defending champion Nuggets won nonetheless. He still coughed it up four times in OKC but shot 12-for-16 from the field. Holmgren amassed 13 rebounds and seven blocks two days earlier in Cleveland. Against Jokic and the Nuggets, he had four boards and no blocks. Try as he might to match the muscle and physicality of a two-time MVP, Jokic was completely unbothered by his matchup whenever he touched the ball in Denver’s half-court offense. In the third quarter, Holmgren was trying to ready himself for Jokic to get the ball in the low post by lowering his head into Jokic’s midsection.
Holmgren was able to punch back offensively with 19 points — it’s easy to see the vision considering how smooth someone of that length is off the bounce — the Thunder’s best player was kept in check. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander started 0-for-10 and didn’t score from the field until almost four minutes into the second half. He finished 2-for-16 shooting against a Nuggets defense that was rotating cohesively, closing out cleanly and rebounding robustly.
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