The Denver Nuggets edged the Phoenix Suns 125\u2013123 on Tuesday night behind another historic performance from Nikola Joki\u0107.<\/p>\n
Joki\u0107 finished with 23 points, 17 rebounds and 17 assists\u2014tying a season high in dimes\u2014and delivered the game-winner, knocking down a 12-foot jumper with 11.5 seconds remaining. Devin Booker had a clean look at a potential winning 3-pointer on the other end, but it rattled out at the buzzer.<\/p>\n
Denver appeared in control late, leading by eight with just over three minutes left, but Phoenix rallied. Booker tied the game at 123 with a tough lane jumper with 30.2 seconds to play, setting the stage for Joki\u0107\u2019s heroics.<\/p>\n
The three-time MVP recorded his NBA-leading 29th triple-double by early in the third quarter, orchestrating the offense with ease\u2014including a full-court dime to Christian Braun for a layup. Jamal Murray added 21 points, while Tim Hardaway Jr. chipped in 18 off the bench.<\/p>\n
Phoenix stayed within striking distance throughout. Grayson Allen and Jalen Green each scored 21 points, and Jordan Goodwin helped spark a third-quarter push as the Suns cut a double-digit deficit to two entering the fourth.<\/p>\n
The Nuggets, now winners of six of their last eight, sit just 1.5 games behind the Los Angeles Lakers for the No. 3 spot in the Western Conference. The Suns, meanwhile, have dropped six of seven and remain seventh in the West, fighting to stay out of the play-in.<\/p>\n
Up next: Denver hosts the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday, while Phoenix welcomes the Utah Jazz on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Denver Nuggets edged the Phoenix Suns 125\u2013123 on Tuesday night behind another historic performance from Nikola Joki\u0107.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678401,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3791],"tags":[7,6,2065,472,4045,604],"class_list":{"0":"post-678400","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix-suns","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-phoenix","11":"tag-phoenix-suns","12":"tag-phoenixsuns","13":"tag-suns"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116290475003903114","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678400\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}