Battle of NBA Finals: Michael Malone, Stars & Harmony Within Nuggets’ Get Shinning & Winning Kudos It Deserves

Michael Malone, head coach of the Denver Nuggets, was ready for anything Erik Spoelstra, head coach of the Miami Heat, could throw at his club from the opening tip of Game 1 of the 2023 NBA Finals.

A championship with this eighth-seeded team would have made a case for the greatest coaching job in NBA history, but after all the talk about Spoelstra and Heat Culture through the Eastern Conference finals, we should take a moment to appreciate the atmosphere Malone is creating in Denver.

“They’ve built something that’s stable, that’s consistent,” Spoelstra said. As in, “You know what they stand for.”

Spoelstra said

For the first time in the franchise’s history, they are NBA champions. Since the NBA transitioned to a best-of-seven format for the first round, Denver’s 16-4 run through the playoffs is second only to the 2017 Golden State Warriors’ record.

Even now, Malone isn’t finished. Afterwards, he informed the Denver audience, “We want more,” referring to more championship action.

Pat Riley, president of the Heat, “said something many years ago,” Malone remarked. When I was head coach in Sacramento, I kept a quote on the wall that read, “You start as a nobody, but you can work your way up to being an upstart, a winner, a contender, a champion, and finally a dynasty. Therefore, we are not content.

Pat Riley, president of the Heat,

“We did something that has never been done by this franchise before, and I think we just showed through 16 playoff wins what we are capable of. We have a lot of young talented players in that locker room.”

Pat Riley, president of the Heat.

Spoelstra tried to replicate the success of his small-ball starting lineup from Game 1 against the Boston Celtics in Game 2 and Game 3, but Malone destroyed the Heat.

With a week to prepare for the Heat, the Nuggets saw 6-foot-8, 235-pound forward Aaron Gordon as an X-factor and fed him aggressively at the rim against lesser players in the first quarter of Game 1. Spoelstra called timeout 5 minutes and 26 seconds into the series because they went to him four times and he scored four times.

After that, Denver never looked back in Game 1, eventually winning by as many as 24 points. In Game 2, Spoelstra opted to play Kevin Love instead of Caleb Martin in a bigger lineup.

Against a team that hits every opponent with the realisation that it never stops tugging, the Nuggets took a counterpunch in the first quarter, rode their bench to a 15-pound lead in the second quarter, and then let go of the rope.

After the Heat tied the series, many wondered if they had succeeded in reshaping Nikola Jokic into more of a scorer than a facilitator.

Spoelstra shot down the idea, and the conversation shifted to his comments about how that was just the perspective of a “untrained eye,” rather than what his response said about Malone: They don’t play like that. So many of their moves are designed solely to put you at risk.

Malone agreed, saying that his team simply didn’t give the kind of effort needed to overcome the Heat and win the championship.

This was a close game that was decided by a few inches and a good look from Jamal Murray. Malone was also aware that his squad would react to his criticism of them in public.

After his team suffered their first loss in over a month, he expressed his concern that his players weren’t giving 100%. “This is the NBA Finals, and we are talking about effort; that’s a huge concern of mine,” he stated.

When I mentioned we didn’t play well in Game 1, you probably believed I was making up a story. We had a poor performance. We had some guys playing like it was either the preseason or the regular season, and they were feeling sorry for themselves because they weren’t making shots. NBA championship game. I find that extremely puzzling and disheartening.

Malone’s call-out was effective because he had previously given his team the freedom to do what he wanted them to do in response to a loved one’s displeasure. When he asked, “You guys tell me why they lost,” they were able to confidently explain the situation.

“Miami came in here and outworked us,” the commentator said, “and we were by far our least disciplined game of these 17 playoff games.” When the coach’s lieutenants, the more seasoned voices in the locker room, repeat his message in interviews, you know his message has hit home.

“Yeah,” Jeff Green responded. “Man, it’s the Finals. Our power needs to increase.

For Game 3, Denver not only brought more intensity but also some tactical tweaks from Malone on defence and offence.

To better account for Miami’s shooters, he sent fewer defenders to help on Adebayo and Jimmy Butler, and he used Christian Braun, a promising youngster, as a zone-busting cutter.

All seven of Braun’s attempts at the basket were successful, and the Nuggets’ double-digit victory contributed to the Heat’s drop in three-point shooting efficiency (from 17-for-35 in Game 2 to 11-for-35 in Game 3).

When it mattered most, Denver’s defence stepped up and held the Heat to 100 points per 100 possessions in four losses, which was better than the best defensive rating of the pace-and-space era.

To to Braun, “They’re a really good team” describes the Heat. They are very adaptable, and their coach is excellent. We need to figure out how to counter all of the obstacles they throw at us.

They’ve tried the press, the zone, and a variety of other looks to keep us off balance. They’re performing admirably so far. Our trainers are setting us up to not just compete with them, but to defeat them as well.

Malone deserves credit for reminding his team that their offensive prowess is not enough to win the championship. When a coach has been in charge for eight years and his team has a historically great offence, it can be difficult to get his players to listen to his defence sermons.

Not in Denver, where the head coach and his top players are on the same page and can effectively communicate with each other and the rest of the team. When everyone in the locker room is on the same page, the team’s resolve is unwavering.

DeAndre Jordan, a seasoned bench player with the Nuggets, has stated of Malone, “He’s a competitor at heart.” We can see how determined and combative he is. He’s as dedicated to winning as any of us, and I think having a leader with that type of drive is crucial; his enthusiasm has rubbed off on the team.

Consider Michael Porter Jr. as an illustration. Despite Porter’s 24-year-old age and offensive problems in this series, Malone’s insistence on defence from the highly regarded prospect paid dividends years later.

Malone made a decision to ride Braun in the second half of Game 3, but he switched to Porter’s defence against Miami’s man-to-man looks in Game 4. If it weren’t for Malone’s efforts in the past, Denver would have lost Porter for good.

A quality that Porter admires greatly about Coach Malone is his consistency. He hasn’t changed his approach to coaching or trying to inspire us at all this season.

He likes to win at all costs. He was just as disappointed about losing Game [81] [against Utah] as he would be about losing a game today. He always uses the same methods when coaching us, both individually and collectively. That is an understandable point of view to me.

The Nuggets’ first championship was largely due to Jokic’s selfless style of play and his ability to implement it on the court. But the coach has to encourage that kind of play from everyone before it can spread throughout the team and be relied upon when the two-time MVP isn’t on the court.

Indeed, amid Jokic’s fourth-quarter foul trouble in Game 4, Gordon fell into a small-ball version of Jokic’s role. Gordon screened his man and passed the ball to Murray, who drained a 3-pointer to halt a hot start for the Heat.

The Nuggets used the play to score 14 points in a pair of road wins on just 10 possessions after using a timeout.

Spoelstra noted after his team lost a tough Game 4 by double digits that it was indicative of how good the Denver Nuggets squad was in the series, the season, and the playoffs as a whole. They dominated every series they played. They’ve earned the title of champions.

Then came Game 5, an absolute brawl compared to anything the Nuggets had seen all year. In the first quarter, they shot 1% from 3-point range, made only 9 of 19 free throws, turned the ball over 14 times, and saw Jokic and Gordon both get into foul trouble.

When the season is on the line and the championship is at stake, only a team whose players have committed every play to muscle memory can pull off the kind of performance necessary to win.

In the middle of the season, I was all like, ‘Hey, we’re not your little babies anymore,'” she said.

Murray, who has played under Malone for his entire seven-year NBA career, said, “We’re grown men, and if we make a mistake just come talk to us. He had to have that sort of power and defensive posture to really get on us and draw it out of us when we weren’t very good. It’s almost as though we’ve figured out the secret to victory. We’re on the same page with what’s expected of us, and we can harp on each other to improve.

When Malone’s team was behind after the first three quarters, he would call timeout, and the Nuggets would come out on top. The game was decided in the third quarter with a 9-2 run powered by the unified will of champions.

Malone encouraged his guys, “One more win,” right before they sealed the deal. Just go out and grab it. There’s no way anyone is going to hand us a championship. Spoelstra hailed the game his team played in the fourth quarter their “most aggressive defensive game of the season,” and Malone told his team in the huddle, “It’s right there. Get it.

And Denver did, making Malone, 51, a champion for the first time in his 30-year coaching career, just like his father Brendan, an assistant for the “Bad Boy” Detroit Pistons.

Almost every time Malone pushed a button or threw a switch, the series ended with Denver as the victor. A championship not only cements Malone’s status as one of the best in his field but also confirms Jokic’s status as an all-timer and Murray’s as a worthy co-star.

Malone was just as good as Spoelstra, who lacked the necessary horses to make this a contest, and that fact should serve as a warning to all of the teams out there who are hoping to put together a championship contender in the near future.

Malone has ensured the long-term viability of the Nuggets culture.

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