Denver Nuggets head coach Michael Malone has explained his decision not to call a timeout at the conclusion of Game 2.
The decision, or lack thereof, came after the Nuggets grabbed a rebound off a missed Jimmy Butler three with 11 seconds to go. Down 111-108, they needed a three to send the game to overtime, but rather than calling a timeout Malone opted to let his players run the show. The result? A decent Jamal Murray look which no doubt looked good, but which fell just short and rimmed out, resigning the Nuggets to a three-point loss and tying the series at one-game apiece.
Unsurprisingly there were plenty of questions about the non-timeout call in the wake of the loss, with Malone explaining that he didn't want to “let them get set.”
“You take a timeout, you let them get set, you let them review whatever play they think that we’re going to run and there’s a great chance that we don’t get a quality shot like Jamal got,” he said. “Which was on line and from my perspective, looked like it had a great chance of going in. And we’ve seen Jamal make shots like that before.”
It's an age-old question for coaches – whether to take a timeout in this kind of situation or trust your players to find themselves a good shot. Malone evidently would prefer to place his faith in his players straight off the rebound, and with Murray and particularly Nikola Jokic on the floor, it's easy to understand why.
We'll never know what the outcome would have been had Michael Malone taken a timeout, but with the Nuggets offense as consistently capable of finding good looks as any team in recent memory, it's very possible that he would make the same call again.
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