Michael Porter Jr. played all but two minutes of the fourth quarter in the Denver Nuggets' Game 1 win over the Los Angeles Lakers on Tuesday night.

Nuggets head coach Michael Malone trusted Porter Jr. to close out the game, which got much more interesting towards the end than they would've liked. But if Malone needed to go a different direction, MPJ would have happily obliged.

“He cares. He wants to win a championship,” said Michael Malone. “He came up to me in the Phoenix series and says, ‘If you want to get Bruce in at the end of the game, whatever you think is gonna help us win the game, I just wanna win.'”

Malone harped on Michael Porter Jr.'s defense and effort, particularly in getting a crucial 50-50 ball that led to a highlight of the night: Aaron Gordon's alley-oop slam to put the Nuggets up six in crunch time.

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“It's just another example of a guy being selfless and realizing that this is much bigger than any individual. This is about the collective,” the Nuggets coach said of Michael Porter Jr.

The Nuggets forward had himself a decent night with 15 points and 10 rebounds on an efficient 50 percent from the field. But it's the hustle plays, which included two blocks in Game 1, as well as the complete buy-in Malone emphasized that point to the massive growth he's' had to become a winning player.

Michael Porter Jr. just wants to help the Denver Nuggets get over the hump and win its first NBA championship in franchise history. Everything else is secondary.