Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic knows they weren't supposed to be in the West Finals, at least that what most pundits believed. However, the Mile High City team proved all their doubters wrong.
On Tuesday, the Nuggets completed a historic 3-1 comeback to send the Los Angeles Clippers packing and book their ticket to the Conference Finals against the Los Angeles Lakers. Jokic, for his part, led his team to victory with a huge triple double of 16 points, 22 rebounds and 13 assists.
After the game, Jokic admitted that while “nobody” wanted them to reach the West Finals, the Nuggets have more than proven that they are capable of winning on the biggest stage.
“Nobody wants us here. Nobody thinks that we can do something. We proved to ourselves and to everybody we can do something,” Jokic said in an interview with ESPN (via Michael Scotto of USA Today).
True enough, not many picked the Nuggets to move past the star-studded Clippers, especially after they fell behind 3-1 in the series. However, Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray and Co. mustered enough strength and belief to claw back and steal the series — all while erasing last year’s bitter seven-game defeat to the Portland Trail Blazers in the second round.
The Nuggets are now back in the Western Conference Finals for the first time since Carmelo Anthony and Chauncey Billups led the squad in 2009. For what it's worth, that Denver squad lost the series against, incidentally, the Lakers.
Sure enough, the Nuggets don't want history to repeat itself.
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