In familiar script, Nuggets come from double-digits down to beat Lakers, take 3-0 series lead

LOS ANGELES — The Denver Nuggets are inevitable.

As are some hard questions about the Lakers' direction this offseason.

That offseason could start Sunday. Thursday night, the Denver Nuggets followed a familiar script: They took the Lakers' best punch early, settled down, came from double-digits down, and beat Los Angeles behind a big night from Nikola Jokic.

The final score was 112-105 Nuggets on Thursday, putting them up 3-0 in a series that mirrors Denver's sweep of this same Los Angeles team in last year's Western Conference Finals. Game 4 is Sunday in Los Angeles.

Denver has beaten Los Angeles 11 straight games – the Lakers haven't topped the Nuggets since 2022 (nearly 500 days ago).

"Winning is a lifestyle for us," Nikola Jokic said.

While Lakers coach Darvin Ham may be on the hot seat and made some tactical missteps during this series, he's not the reason the Lakers are losing this series. There are only so many adjustments and rotation changes that Ham can try to change the momentum of this series.

"I think they're just beating us, to be honest," Austin Reaves said. "You can talk about adjustments, you can talk about this and that, but at the end of the day we gotta go put our best foot forward and win basketball games."

That best foot forward would involve hitting some shots — the Lakers were 5-of-27 from 3 for the game (18.5%) and shot just 9-of-34 outside the paint for the night. D'Angelo Russell — who was critical to the Lakers' offensive uptick down the stretch of the regular season — was 0-of-7. Anthony Davis led the Lakers with 33 points and 15 rebounds, while LeBron had 26 points and Austin Reaves added 22. No other Laker scored in double digits.

"We've just got to be a little more intentional," Reaves said. "I think we get away from what's working on sometimes, we get a little random and like I said they start to take advantage of all those opportunities.”

Denver's execution can feel relentless — they demand 48 minutes of near-perfect basketball from their opponents, and the Lakers don't have the talent or tenacity to meet that. Aaron Gordon led the Nuggets with 29 points and 15 rebounds, while Jokic had 24 points and another 15 rebounds, and Jamal Murphy scored 22.

What should worry the Lakers and their fans is Denver hasn't played its best basketball yet. For example, on Thursday they shot 5-of-28 from 3.

The Lakers had their chances, particularly early.

Pregame, Nuggets coach Michael Malone talked about his team needing to get off to a faster start on the road, he didn't want his team having to fight back from 12 or 20 down like they did in the first two games of this series.

Then out of the gate, the Nuggets turned the ball over three times in the first couple of minutes and the Lakers raced out to an 8-0 lead capped by a LeBron James breakaway dunk.

But we've all seen this movie before. The Nuggets settled down but the Lakers lead was still 10 after one quarter and got as high as 12.

Denver just kept executing. The Nuggets nibbled away, and the Lakers led by 4 at the half, then Denver opened the third quarter on a 9-2 run. Once the Nuggets got the lead, they never let go. The game felt over.

Which is what this series feels like.