NBA Finals MVP big man Nikola Jokic returned to his elite form during the game against Los Angeles, recording a triple-double during his first game of the season.
During the fourth quarter of the victory, Nuggets fans began showering the court with an overwhelmingly loud chant. Even on the television broadcast, those watching at home could clearly hear those in the arena shouting “Who’s your daddy?” at the Lakers.
“Who’s your daddy?” chant breaks out to end this Nuggets-Lakers season opener. pic.twitter.com/ewAstHHqc4
Then, he flagged down Nuggets head coach Mike Malone and put the blame on him. Here is what he said:
“This is you. This is your fault. … We gotta go to [indecipherable] and this is what you started.”
Murray then shared a laugh with Malone, though his assessment probably isn’t entirely incorrect.
During the playoffs last season, Malone called out the media for attempting to spin some sort of narrative about the Lakers. Malone was then introduced at the parade as “the Lakers daddy” after the Nuggets won the title.
What’s better than winning a championship? Winning more.
Since his days at Kentucky, Jamal Murray has been touted as the “Blue Arrow,” a baller with elite instincts and sharpshooting skills similar to the superpowers of the Marvel Comics characters he secretly likes.
Murray is in his seventh season with the Denver Nuggets, where he’s won a championship and earned NBA All-Rookie Second Team honors in 2017. During the Nuggets’ historic NBA Finals run, the Canadian point guard cooked the Miami Heat — kitchen puns intended — averaging 21.4 points, 10 assists, and 6.2 rebounds per game.
Ahead of the Nuggets 2023-2024 season opener on October 24th against the Los Angeles Lakers (7:30 p.m. ET on TNT), For The Win spoke with Murray — who was promoting his partnership with STARRY and KFC, including The Jamal Murray Meal — about advice he has for others who might battle tough injuries and which superhero he would want to be.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
You need a lot of star power on your roster in order to win a championship in the NBA and several teams just added significant talent.
As the offseason ended, the Bucks traded for Damian Lillard while the Celtics added Jrue Holiday. Earlier this offseason, meanwhile, the Suns added Bradley Beal to a lineup that already had Kevin Durant and Devin Booker. But how do these revamped contenders stack up with the league’s top three-man lineups?
Many publications have ranked the best duos in the NBA — which you can read here, here, here or here. But we wanted to look at the best star trios in the league right now. Here is what we concluded:
Note: Net rating is how many points per 100 possession each team has outscored opponents when these three players are on the court at the same time.
MVP winners like Giannis and Jokic will be missed.
While there are a lot of great players who are representing their countries in the upcoming FIBA World Cup, several important players can’t make out.
Of course, for whatever reason, it’s not exactly uncommon for American stars like LeBron James to skip out on FIBA World Cup action. During the last tournament, only four Americans who made the NBA All-Star team were on the roster.
But it is a bit more unusual for an international star to not suit up during the tournament, so we decided to look at the most notable players who aren’t able to make it.
Players like Australia’s Ben Simmons (who hasn’t played for his national team in over a decade) were excluded from this list.
Joel Embiid, who has citizenship in France and the United States as well as Cameroon, was also not included because he has not played on the FIBA circuit.
Meanwhile, here are the other players who won’t be rostered when the tournament begins on August 25.
After making the Guinness Book of World Records in 2021, Olivier Rioux has once again taken the internet’s notice with some highlight footage from Brookwood Elite, a Canadian AAU team. At 17 years old, Rioux is 7-foot-6, according to his Instagram …
After making the Guinness Book of World Records in 2021, Olivier Rioux has once again taken the internet’s notice with some highlight footage from Brookwood Elite, a Canadian AAU team.
At 17 years old, Rioux is 7-foot-6, according to his Instagram page (and 231 cm on his FIBA page, to be exact, which is closer to 7-foot-6.5). He is listed at 300 pounds on 247Sports, an encouraging number, given as many prospects of his massive size are very thin — Bol Bol, for instance, was about 180 pounds in the summer of 2016, when he was 16 years old, according to DraftExpress.
(USA TODAY Network)
Rioux grew up in Canada and has been at IMG Academy since July 2021. The game looks easy at his size, as highlight reels show him being a menace at the rim on both sides of the ball, grabbing offensive rebounds and swatting away shot attempts.
7-foot-6 Olivier Rioux is going off this summer! He holds the Guinness World Record for tallest teenager 😱 pic.twitter.com/k21JYdldPA
He played for the Canadas U19 team this summer. Rioux was at the end of the bench, appearing in 31 total minutes over five games, but in those limited minutes, he averaged 3.2 points and 3.4 rebounds, including 1.4 offensive rebounds per game. Rioux made seven of the eight shots he attempted.
Take a look at actual game footage instead of only highlight footage. You can start with about 4:45 left in the game to see him play a somewhat uninterrupted stretch. Team Canada switched to a 2-3 zone when Rioux entered, so he was camped in the paint on defense the whole time; while on offense, he did some pick-and-roll action and worked to get position down low.
It appears Rioux has received relatively minimal recruiting action, as On3 sites offers from only Stetson and Florida Atlantic. With two years left of high school basketball, collegiate programs will likely look to see if his offensive skills go beyond height and see how he defends on the perimeter and adjusts to offensive schemes.
On3 lists him as a 3-star prospect, while 247Sports, ESPN and Rivals all do not have him ranked.
While collegiate teams might not be paying a ton of attention yet, Rioux has garnered attention from the pros. He made a congratulations Instagram post to Jamal Murray after the NBA Finals, reminding the Denver Nuggets point guard about that time several years ago when Murray asked for a picture from Rioux, who at that point was a 12-year-old standing 6-foot-10.
Given he won his sole title with the Boston Celtics, you might expect a little favoritism about who The Big Ticket thinks is the best duo in the NBA.
Given he won his sole title with the Boston Celtics, you might expect a little favoritism about who The Big Ticket thinks is the best duo in the NBA right since Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown are in the mix. But Kevin Garnett believes Denver Nuggets stars Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray form the best duo in the NBA.
On a recent episode of the Showtime Basketball “KG Certified” podcast, KG praised Murray’s skills as a guard and his ability to play off the ball. Garnett highlighted their chemistry on the court, emphasizing their versatility and how they make their teammates better.
Garnett also discusses the style of play employed by the Nuggets, comparing it to successful teams like the Golden State Warriors.
Check out the clip embedded above to hear what he and fellow former Celtic Paul Pierce have to say about Jokic and Murray as the league’s best duo.
As the Denver crowd was celebrating a Nuggets championship – something the Broncos have only accomplished once in the last 24 years – star point guard Jamal Murray walked past the Wilson family without even acknowledging them.
Of course, it’s hard to imagine Murray was intentionally ignoring them. He was most certainly more focused on celebrating with his team in the locker room than interacting with fans. .
Unfortunately, it’s just another example of the internet having a laugh at Wilson’s expense.
This is the on-site version of FTW’s daily newsletter, The Morning Win. Subscribe to get irreverent and incisive sports stories, delivered to your mailbox every morning. Here’s Robert Zeglinski.
I appreciate that the city of Denver waited almost half a century for the Nuggets to finally win an NBA championship. To get the monkey off one’s back and see your favorite team win it all is a wonderful feeling of relief and joy. But I’m actually most impressed by the Nuggets’ faithful patience in their NBA squad over the years.
First and foremost, I think the Nuggets’ central figures should be commended. One, for taking their time. And two, for believing their road eventually had something special waiting at the end, no matter the inevitable roadblocks. In the NBA’s superteam era — where it feels like superstars are joining forces together every year in pursuit of hopeful greatness — these Nuggets stuck to their script.
I’m not surprised their key cogs were rewarded for it with a historic title.
At courtside, there’s Mike Malone. Once a renowned assistant turned maligned head coach who couldn’t get the previously bumbling Sacramento Kings to work, Malone was hired by the Nuggets in 2015. He’s been instrumental in developing their team culture every step of the way ever since. Despite some bumps in the road — Denver won a mere 33 games in Malone’s first campaign — he’s had nearly a decade to build the organization up to this uncommon climax.
And I can’t emphasize enough how rare that is. After Malone, the NBA’s next longest-tenured coach is Taylor Jenkins, who started with the Memphis Grizzlies… in 2019. Compared with his peers, Malone had all the time in the world to turn the Nuggets into a powerhouse, and they never blinked.
Next is Jamal Murray.
A former top-7 NBA Draft pick, it’s not shocking to see Murray become a difference-maker. However, it took the star point guard four seasons before the term “Bubble Murray” was coined as he became the ideal partner for Nikola Jokic. But then Murray tore his ACL and lost the better part of two years of his career. Two missed playoff runs. Two lost opportunities at championships. Two years where the Nuggets were content to let Murray take his appropriate time in recovery.
Not only because they clearly cared about him, but they also understood the wizardry he’d be capable of if he could get healthy. The Nuggets could’ve just as easily cut their losses and tried to play the free agent game. They could’ve tried to find someone, anyone else, that could complement Jokic. Instead, they waited for Murray, knowing he already worked so well in tandem with the league’s best player. Their belief in him paid off.
No story about these Nuggets is complete without Jokic. He is not only Denver’s leading catalyst but the preeminent example of what it means to develop homegrown players and give them confidence.
Some Nuggets scouts might profess otherwise, but no one in their right mind initially saw Jokic — a seemingly unathletic second-round pick out of Serbia — becoming this good. No one saw him slowly morphing into a legitimate No. 1 option for which opponents have zero answers. But the Nuggets’ coaches did. That’s why they played him at center. That’s why they gave him so much offensive responsibility. That’s why they let him comfortably grow at his own pace — because the potential was always there, and they had a plan.
What a hilarious way to make a splash for two best friends.
It might be only the start of their mutual reign as NBA royalty, but it’s pretty evident that Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray are already great friends. The league’s new leading duo took a postgame dip together after winning the NBA championship in what might be the best public example of their strong rapport to date.
Well, I should say that Murray didn’t have much of a choice in the matter because Jokic simply took him along for the ride and threw his teammate in the pool.
On a night of pure jubilation for the Denver Nuggets, a video from the NBA that shows these two guys having the time of their life in the water probably stands out the most.
Find you a friend that wants to throw you in the pool while you’re holding a celebratory champagne bottle. Your life will be that much more enriched, I assure you.
So, naturally, no one should have been surprised to see Murray immediately reveling at the moment during postgame celebrations in Denver on Monday night. He seemed so especially emotional and appreciative while telling different Nuggets leaders — head coach Mike Malone, owner Stan Kroenke, and of course, his pal Nikola Jokic — how much he loves them.
Murray’s “tour” here, so to speak, is a perfect lesson for all of us in what we should do in celebratory occasions. When you reach the pinnacle of your professional life, it’s time to bask and tell the folks who helped you how much you love them.
