Ramona Shelburne tells me WHAT HAS CHANGED for the Denver Nuggets | NBA Today

Ramona Shelburne tells me WHAT HAS CHANGED for the Denver Nuggets | NBA Today

In game one, Joic became just the fourth player in postseason history to go for at least 40 points, 20 rebounds, five assists, joining Wilt, Shaq, and Giannis. He also tied Jamal Murray for the most 40-point games in Nuggets playoff history. For the Thunder, SGA shooting just 41 and a half% from the field this postseason. That’s down over 10 percentage points from what he shot in the regular season. So, can he turn it up is a question. And uh oops, Aaron Gordon, he did it again. He hit a go-ahead three with 3.6 seconds left. He’s one of six players in the play-by-play era with multiple go-ahead makes in the final five seconds of the fourth quarter or overtime in a single postseason since 1998. It’s been insane to watch. We now welcome in our senior writer Ramona Shelurn from Oklahoma City ahead of game two. Ramona, this Nuggets team, it seemed kind of dead in the water 10 days ago. Both of us were sitting here in Los Angeles watching them and now they have homec court advantage over a 68 win team with a chance to go up two to nothing tonight. What has changed? Well, you know, we were talking to David Adelman who’s the head coach now the head coach of this team, right? He’s the interim head coach and he said, you know, he was asked like how different has this team been since you’ve been the head coach and Michael Malone was the only coach that these guys have ever had like Nicole Joic and Jamal Murray and when he started coaching them they were boys. They just came into the league. They were young. Now, David Adelman said, “These guys are men. I want to empower them to coach themselves.” And so, you see Jokic in the huddles. I mean, every every shot of him in the huddle seems like he’s coaching the team. And Adam is not insecure about it. He says, “You know what? This is the smartest basketball player in the world. We should let him say whatever he wants.” But it’s also affected the way they’re holding each other accountable, the way they’re coaching each other. And, you know, this team won a championship just two years ago. They know how to do it. They’ve been in game sevens. They’ve been back from 20 point games. And I think you’re starting to see that come together during these playoffs. The other thing that we’re seeing is Jokic step into this leadership role. Sham Shirano reported on our show a couple of weeks ago that he’s more comfortable doing that. We also see the unfathomable stat lines here. But you’re seeing something else from the three-time MVP. What is that? God, it’s so fun covering him day in and day out because you see all these little things, right? And I had an amazing sheet for game one where I was sitting right at the scorers table so you could see everything that he’s do. Now watch watch him walk over here. Okay, so he’s taking the ball and he’s kind of getting his sweat all over it now. And look, remember he has five fouls here. Okay, five fouls. So he can’t get this. He’s got his back to the basket. Oh, he’s going to turn around and he’s going to defend the inbounds pass. So you can’t Alex Caruso can’t see. But look now he’s going to fain like he’s double teaming Shay so they can’t get the ball to him. And there’s Shed Homegrren, the guy they want shooting those free throws instead of Shay Gilgaz Alexander. Just you see how he turns two seconds into that defense there. That’s the basketball genius of Nicole Joic that you always it kind of gets covered up sometimes when you look at the 42 points and the 22 rebounds breakdowns with Momo. That is what I was missing on NBA today and now we have it. Ramona Shelburn, thank you so very much. Enjoy game two. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause]

Ramona Shelburne joins me on NBA Today to report on what has changed for the Denver Nuggets after parting ways with Michael Malone and the coaching under David Adelman.