The Nuggets have beaten the Suns in the last two encounters. Kevin Durant recorded 30 points, 4 rebounds and 6 assists. ![]() On the road at Scotiabank Arena in their last game, they were beaten 112-105 by Toronto Raptors. ![]() Phoenix Suns have won three home games on the spin. Nikola Jokic led by example by landing 32 points and 15 assists. ![]() Nuggets Won Previous H2H Clashĭenver Nuggets made it three consecutive wins after a 134-124 home success over Houston Rockets at Ball Arena. You can currently get 2.10 for this selection which looks good value. But that may be difficult to pull off on the fly, for a team whose stars have played so few minutes together, and who both have it in the nature of their game to fire away from midrange.Īnd if Phoenix can’t flip that switch and quickly change their shot profile to a significant degree, the math game should continue working heavily in Denver’s favor.The Nuggets look opposable on the Moneyline, so we’re going to make the Suns our betting prediction. Game 2 should provide some valuable insight on whether the Suns can or will actually implement that adjustment, and if so, how the Nuggets will counter. “I think we got some guys open at the three-point line but we’re not gonna force any of that, either.” ““We definitely can generate more 3s,” Durant said. Some negative regression for Denver could shift things towards balancing the scales, especially if Durant or Booker heated up, and both tend to do that regularly.īut both Phoenix head coach Monty Williams and Durant acknowledged after the first game the need for the Suns to increase their three-point frequency. In Game 1, in addition to Murray’s blistering six of ten three-point shooting, the Nuggets got contributions on threes from players such as Aaron Gordon (3) and Jeff Green (1), who have been very inconsistent from deep through the course of the season. If Denver were to go cold from the arc, that is surely not out of the question. (Durant and Booker also have the most midrange attempts, with Paul coming in sixth.) But the big question remains regarding whether their elite shooting prowess could be enough to overcome the math problem. In fact, Durant, Booker and Paul lead the league in most midrange shots made this postseason, and they have combined to make 53.9% of them, well above the mid-40s% NBA averages. To the Suns’ credit, one of their counterbalances for this math problem is the fact that in Durant and Booker they have two of the NBA’s most lethal, deadeye midrange shooters on their roster. In Game 1 of their current series, the Nuggets attempted 37 three-point shots, while the Suns put up only 23, and Denver’s advantage in making 16 threes to Phoenix’s seven tallied up to a 27-point advantage for the Nuggets in a game they won by 18. As the chart above shows, the Suns have taken 22.3% of their shots at the rim to the Nuggets’ 31.3%, and 25.0% on three-pointers to Denver’s 33.7%, meaning that Phoenix is taking a full 52.7% of their shots from midrange, compared with just 35.0% for the Nuggets. Now in the playoffs, in addition to location eFG% and rim frequency, Phoenix is 20th – which is to say, last among all postseason teams – in three-point frequency as well. ![]() If the postseason games Phoenix has played up to this point are any indication, the addition of one of the league’s most prolific midrange shooters in Durant, in tandem with the loss of some significant support from behind the three-point arc, has exacerbated the Suns’ shot location quandary. Even though Phoenix actually shot a slightly higher percentage of threes, the big discrepancy between the two teams came at the rim, where Denver attempted 11.2% more shots than their current postseason rival, and the Suns took the smallest share of their shots among all teams in the NBA.īut those figures are for the entirely of the 2022-23 season, most of which does not account for the massive change that came to the Suns with their deadline acquisition of Durant, who due to injury played only eight regular season games for Phoenix, and the loss in that deal of Cameron Johnson and Mikal Bridges, two of Phoenix’s more prolific and efficient three-point shooters.Īnd while the sample size is necessarily small (both the Nuggets and Suns have played just six games this postseason), the apparent impact of the Durant trade on Phoenix’s shot profile has been striking so far.ĭenver Nuggets and Phoenix Suns Shot Frequency, 2023 Playoffs Data via Cleaning the Glass Denver Nuggets and Phoenix Suns Shot Frequency, 2022-23 Regular Season Data via Cleaning the GlassĪs the chart above shows, the Suns had the least efficient location eFG% in the league this regular season, coming in 30th at 53.4%, while the Nuggets were seventh at 55.8%.
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