Clutch time has been to the Nuggets what the power play is to the Avalanche.
On paper and according to conventional wisdom, it should be one of their greatest strengths. They’re a veteran team with championship experience, years of continuity, statistical evidence of elite situational performance in past seasons and, most crucially, a roster tailored to walk down their opponents when the game decelerates into a test of wills and half-court execution. Not unlike how their Ball Arena neighbors are fully armed with the firepower and chemistry to dominate at a man advantage.
So while the Avs continue to reckon with the mysteries behind their NHL-worst scoring rate on the power play, it similarly defies logic that Nikola Jokic and company continue to cough up wins in the pivotal moments. As a team, the Nuggets ranked 26th in clutch time net rating as they tipped off against the Celtics on Wednesday, 9.9 points in the red. With their three-time MVP on the court, the number was more than twice as gnarly at minus-19.3.
Jokic admitted last Sunday that he was concerned by the increasingly puzzling trend. With two days off to regroup (and face a bit of scrutiny) after a wayward road trip, first-year coach David Adelman weighed in, acknowledging that he’s trying to “add some wrinkles” to help Jokic and Jamal Murray while Aaron Gordon isn’t available in the dunker spot and on the perimeter.
“We’re trying to maintain who we are, playing the two-man game without the things that matter behind it,” Adelman said. “Like, if we play a two-man game with Aaron Gordon, it’s a very different rotation (in help defense) for teams. So you don’t want to scrap something that you know you’re gonna do (in the playoffs), and you’re pre-supposing that those guys are gonna be out there. … We have to figure out a way to finish games when teams are full-rotating to (Jokic and Murray). Sometimes three guys, sometimes four. So we talked about that.”
Head coach David Adelman of the Denver Nuggets reacts after a foul call on Jonas Valanciunas (17) after he tangled with Jaylen Wells (0) during the second quarter at Ball Arena in Denver on Wednesday, Feb. 11, 2026. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)Worse in clutch time with Nikola Jokic?
Perhaps the most bizarre aspect of Denver’s overall clutch sample is how it breaks down with and without Jokic. The Nuggets relied on their knack for eking out wins while he was out for a month with a knee injury. They went 8-2 in games involving “clutch time,” defined as any situation when the margin is within five points in the last five minutes. In that same stretch, they went 2-4 in “non-clutch” games. The formula for survival was simple: Win by a little, lose by a lot.
It’s been the exact opposite with Jokic healthy — convincing wins but an overall record suppressed by a poor fourth-quarter execution. The Nuggets are 20-3 in non-clutch games when Jokic plays, and one of those losses was the night he hyperextended his knee during a deadlocked game in Miami. Essentially, Denver has only two uncompetitive losses all season when its star player is on the court.
The glass-half-full viewpoint is that 20-3 is a more accurate indicator of how good the team actually is than its clutch results. After all, clutch time sample sizes are inherently small. Denver has played 136 total clutch minutes this season, the equivalent of 2.83 NBA games.
Still, that small sample size is tangibly impacting the Nuggets’ sense of security in the Western Conference playoff race. In Jokic’s first 10 games back from the injury, they went 1-5 in clutch games, bringing them to 6-13 on the season when he plays.
“I look at the clutch stuff and I go, ‘Well it’s crazy we were so clutch when it was a bunch of guys that weren’t in the rotation to start the season,'” Adelman said. “So things work both ways. And clutch time can just be defense sometimes.”
That gets at the crux of the problem. Denver’s defensive rating in general since Jokic returned has been almost exactly the same as it was in the 16 games without him (115.7 vs. 115.8). But in clutch time, the Nuggets’ ability to protect their paint has deteriorated. They’ve lacked in dribble containment, rim protection and discipline on their help rotations behind the pick-and-roll. During the 1-5 clutch slump, they’re holding opponents to 33.3% from 3-point range. But they’re allowing 68.8 paint points per 100 possessions defended, ranking third-worst in the league. That’s up from 36.2 per 100 possessions when they had their 8-2 clutch surge without Jokic.
“I’ve been more distressed about the four-minute mark on than the last two minutes. I think we’ve had so many screw-ups defensively,” Adelman said. “Our turnovers always keep teams in games. … It’s cost us some games throughout the season.”
The Nuggets worked on situational defensive drills when they held a formal practice on Tuesday, trying to tighten the screws on their scheme and communication. But they also know that their floor as a defensive team will elevate when they get Gordon and Peyton Watson back from hamstring injuries.
While they wait for that, Jokic’s anxiety about shot creation in the clutch is on Adelman’s mind as well. It’s a much less dramatic problem, but a 112.5 offensive rating in clutch time since Jokic returned is also a notable downtick from Denver’s historic scoring efficiency. And if Jokic senses that something is wrong offensively, his feel for the game is usually trustworthy enough to listen.
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Adelman referenced Denver’s first-round playoff series last season, when the Clippers “were the first team that really said, ‘We’ll just flat-out leave people.'” The Nuggets relied on clutch shot-making from Gordon and Russell Westbrook to narrowly advance in seven games.
“It wasn’t Jamal and Nikola,” Adelman said. “So if teams are gonna demand that of us, then our guys have to understand that I have full confidence in any of these guys to take an open shot, and we’ll live with an open shot nightly. The flip side of that is we can’t turn the ball over. Jamal and Nikola have to be cleaner at the end of the game, and I think with that, (what) will follow is wide-open shots for other people.”
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