Denver Gazette beat writer Vinny Benedetto takes you around the NBA and inside the Nuggets locker room:

NBA Insider

As big of a missed opportunity as Game 4 was, the Nuggets live to fight at least another four days.

“It’s not a funeral, guys,” Jamal Murray said in the postgame locker room after Sunday’s 92-87 loss to the Thunder. “It’s best out of three. We lost a game. Onto the next.”

The Nuggets survived a historically futile first quarter, scoring eight points on a 2-of-22 shooting performance, and hung around until the shots started to fall in the second and third quarters. It looked like the Nuggets were on their way to a 3-1 series lead after taking an eight-point lead early in the fourth quarter only for the tables to turn once more.

The primary consequence was conceding home-court advantage back to the Thunder, who host Tuesday’s Game 5 and Sunday’s Game 7, if the Nuggets can manage to take one of the next two.

“You got to dig somewhere deep. You’ve got to go into the reserve tank. … That’s what we’ve got to do. We’ve got to dig deep now,” Nuggets forward Aaron Gordon said.

“I’m sure, I’m confident that we’re capable of that.”

Home-court advantage hasn’t meant much to either team this season. The Nuggets and Thunder split a back-to-back set at Paycom Center during the regular season and did so again in the first two games of the second-round series. The Thunder are also 2-2 at Ball Arena between the regular season and playoffs.

“It’s not the end of the world. It’s a 2-2 series,” Nuggets forward Peyton Watson said. “Obviously, we had a great opportunity to capitalize and kind of put some distance between us and them tonight, but we didn’t take advantage of it. So, we’ve got to go on the road and do it the hard way.”

Tuesday’s Game 5 is familiar yet foreign territory for the Nuggets. Denver has split the first four games of a series six times since 2019. The Nuggets have advanced four times, including this year’s first-round series against the Clippers and the 2023 second-round series against the Suns. The most recent loss was least year’s second-round exit against the Timberwolves. Oddly enough, Denver has had home-court advantage in each instance, which is not the case this time around.

The winner of Tuesday’s game is firmly in control of the series. A win Sunday would’ve given the Nuggets an even more commanding position, but the path of least resistance has rarely been Denver’s chosen route.

“I’m not going to say it’s no big deal. It’s not a team that we take lightly,” Gordon said.

“It’s not going to be easy, and we don’t want it easy. We’re a team that likes it gritty. We can get it rough. We can get it grimy. That’s what we’re going to do.”

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What I’m Thinking

Scheduling the playoffs can’t be easy, but it can’t be as hard as the NBA made it look Sunday.

If there’s a reason why the Nuggets and Thunder got the matinee tip for a game played in Colorado, while the Pacers vs. Cavaliers game, played in Indiana, got the evening time slot, it’s beyond me. Denver and Oklahoma City started later on Friday night than the Cavaliers and Pacers. Why not keep it consistent?

It’s also worth noting that the Pacers and Cavaliers had two days off between Games 2 and 3, while the Thunder and Nuggets have been going every other day and will continue to do so through Thursday’s Game 6 at Ball Arena before a potential two-day break before Game 7.

Your daily report on everything sports in Colorado – covering the Denver Broncos, Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche, and columns from Woody Paige and Paul Klee.

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That’s not the say the Nuggets have an excuse for blowing Game 4. Gordon came closer than any other member of the Nuggets to blaming the scheduling.

“Absolutely,” Aaron Gordon said of the short window between games impacting the hard-to-watch start of Sunday’s game.

“A 36-hour turnaround, playing the highest level of basketball that you could possibly play … but that’s part of it. It’s something that we’ve got to get through.”

Sure, Sunday’s early start benefited the younger, deeper Thunder, and Oklahoma City’s advantage in depth was on full display. Denver still had the advantage of playing at altitude, even if the home-court advantage wasn’t as obvious as it was for the 8 p.m. tip Friday.

“Give them credit, man. That was a mentally tough win,” Nuggets interim coach David Adelman said. “We all were dealing with the same situation. They came out on top.”

The scheduling snafu did a disservice to the top two candidates for most valuable player and diluted the product for those who watched the slog that was Game 4 of the most entertaining matchup of the second round.

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What They’re Saying

Denver relied heavily on its zone defense in Game 4 and largely got the desired result against Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams.

“We took away the paint like we wanted to. We showed Shai and Jalen a lot of looks. I thought we did a pretty good job on those guys, but you give their team credit,” the Nuggets’ interim coach said. “A really disgusting basketball game, those guys made plays, enough plays to push them over the edge.”

Nikola Jokic offered his opinion on what the Nuggets need to do to reestablish home-court advantage and win Game 5.

“We need to give ourselves a chance. We need to play physical. We need to be more physical than them, aggressive,” Jokic said. “Of course, they’re favorites. They’re playing amazing.”

Thunder win rebounding battle for third straight game as physicality ramps up | Nuggets notes

What I’m Following

– Cooper Flagg can start looking for homes in Dallas. The Mavericks improbably won the draft lottery Monday night. San Antonio, Philadelphia and Charlotte rounded out the top four.

– One of those top picks could end up being made by Milwaukee. Giannis Antetokounmpo is open to exploring the possibilities of continuing his career elsewhere, according to an ESPN report.

– Cleveland got another injury to monitor ahead of an elimination game against the Pacers on Tuesday. Darius Garland, De’Andre Hunter and Evan Mobley missed Game 2. Now, Donovan Mitchell is questionable for Tuesday’s game after spraining his left ankle Sunday.

Mark Kiszla: Five seconds of stupidity will haunt Nuggets from their ugly loss to Oklahoma City

– Get ready for NBA commentator Michael Jordan. The Hall of Famer is joining NBC’s crew as a “special contributor” when the network starts broadcasting games again next season.