Paul Klee: Game 1 suggests short NBA Finals for Nuggets

Sports columnist

One part of Nikola Jokic's legendary routine is a wind sprint.

It's a spirited sprint, almost violent. Do not get in his way.

It happens outside the Nuggets locker room at Ball Arena — Thursday night in Game 1 of Denver's first NBA Finals, or on a November Monday against the Hornets. His 300-ish pounds barreling at full speed creates a whoooosh like you’re standing on a Light Rail track.

Did you see anything in the Nuggets’ 104-93 rout that suggests the Miami Heat can stop this Nuggets train over seven games? I sure didn't. Stay healthy, and the Nuggets coast.

Beneath his retired No. 44 jersey way up in the rafters, Dan Issel proclaimed, "Nuggets in five."

With all due respect to the Horse and the Heat, five seems long.

The Nuggets bullied the Timberwolves, Suns, Lakers and now they’re going to bully the Heat. The Nuggets are the NBA's bullies now. Wild.

Oh, Michael Malone said the right things about the Heat after the Nuggets took a 1-0 series lead: "They’re not going to go quietly into that good night." But size plays. Size travels.

Break it down with all the numbers nerds at ESPN, but the Nuggets are too big for the Heat.

On a Nuggets night that would make your 1992 head spin, super-fan Vicki Ray summed up the feelings of 19,000 believers who remember when Nuggets tickets were $6 instead of $600.

"I’ve waited 32 years for this," said Ray, a delightful woman who has greeted Nuggets players in the tunnel with signs and snacks for three decades.

And when the Nuggets clinched their first Finals spot, "I cried," she said.

Nuggets fans deserved this so much. I got so many "I can't believe this is happening" texts from Nuggets lifers that I put it on airplane mode. They watched the beloved cruise to a Finals win with their kids. The next Dad step is to remind the little ones it hasn't always been like this. Trust us on that. Game 2's on Sunday.

"It was beautiful," Nuggets bruiser Aaron Gordon said after. "During the national anthem, I was like, ‘Wow.’"

Twenty-eight playoff berths without reaching the championship round was the longest streak in the NBA, MLB, NHL or NFL. What kind of giddy mood did Nuggets fans live in Game 1? Well, they gave a standing ovation to a Laker. I guess all it takes to forgive Shaq for years of imposing on the Nuggets is an NBA Finals appearance.

It's the Nuggets who do the imposing now. The Heat wore the same look on their face as the T-Wolves, Suns and Lakers before them: How do you deal with all this Nuggets size?

Mt. Jokic, Mt. Gordon, Mt. Porter belong on the poster of Colorado's 14ers that hangs in every Breckenridge VRBO rental. They’re enormous. Jokic is 6-foot-11, 284 pounds. Michael Porter Jr. is 6-10 and has shoulders now. Aaron Gordon is 6-8, 235. His shoulders have shoulders. The sheer size of the Nuggets was the first thing I wrote when Gordon debuted for the Nuggets and turned their frontcourt into the baddest bunch of bodyguards in the NBA.

All the Xs and Os in Erik Spoelstra's big basketball brain can't shrink the Three Peaks.

"Yeah, we’re definitely going to have to go to school on it," Spoelstra said after.

The Nuggets play a dazzling brand of action ball. It's based in European principles of constant movement and smart decisions. But after nine days off, the Nuggets got the train back on the tracks with old-fashioned bully ball. Jokic had another triple-double. Porter was a game-high plus-20. Gordon beat up on his defender with 16 points, each bucket more physical than the last.

The Heat shot only two free throws because creeping into the paint looked like a painful idea.

"Our guys were so locked in going into Game 1," Malone said.

You know what else they were? The Nuggets were bullies. The Three Peaks had 57 points, 29 rebounds and four blocks. The Heat aren't built for that kind of punishment. Nobody is.

The Nuggets haven't lost in almost a month. The last time they lost, it took 72 points between Kevin Durant and Devin Booker to beat them. They’ve lost only three (out of 16) playoff games. One came in overtime, the other two were by seven and five points. Nobody's really beat-beat the Nuggets in the postseason.

The Heat are a proud bunch. They won't go quietly, as Malone said. But I didn't see a path to four wins over the next six games — not with Jokic, Gordon and Porter blocking safe passage.

"Effort. Want. Energy," Gordon said. "That's where it starts."

Russell Wilson brought his son, Future. Peyton Manning brought his son, Marshall. More great Dad moves. They’ll attend 1,000 sporting events in their lives and never will forget this Game 1.

On the happiest night in Nuggets history, Rocky the SuperMascot swished his halfcourt shot.

When Bruce Brown's 3-pointer handed the Nuggets a 21-point lead, it felt like decades of Steph Curry, Jeff Hornacek or Michael Cooper hitting that same shot vanished into our thin air.

This Nuggets run has a Rocktober feeling to it, only nothing changed with a long layoff before the championship round. The Nuggets continued being better than everyone else in the NBA.

Until Joker got here, I never thought I’d see an NBA Finals game in Denver. With the Joker train surging and with the help of his big, bad buddies, I doubt we’ll see two more this season.

(Contact Gazette sports columnist Paul Klee at [email protected] or on Twitter at @bypaulklee.)

In The First One, The Nuggets were The High and The Mighty.

Sports columnist

Denver sports columnist for The Gazette