Portland Trail Blazers: 4 keys to victory over the Nuggets in the NBA playoffs

Portland Trail Blazers Key No. 2: Slowing down Nikola Jokic and Michael Porter Jr.

Let us be clear; The Blazers will not stop Jokic and Porter from getting theirs. All they can hope to do is make them work a little harder on both ends of the court and not give them easy opportunities to score or make plays for others.

These two stars for the Nuggets can lead this team to the Western Conference Finals if everything clicks.

Even though Denver is coming into this series missing Murray, they still have the guy who is most likely to win the NBA’s MVP in Nikola Jokic. He is one of the most intelligent players globally and can impact the game in a variety of ways. He can go one on one, score from all three levels, and if you double him, he makes the correct play 99 percent of the time.

Jokic, in the regular season this year, put up 26.4 points, 10.8 rebounds and 8.3 assists per game while shooting 56.6 percent from the field, 38.8 percent from the 3-point line and 86.8 percent from the free-throw line per game.

The second-best player on this team as it stands right now is Michael Porter Jr. He is only in his second year and is already one of the league’s best shooters/scorers. At 6’10”, he causes many problems for teams with his quickness for his size, shooting ability and ball handling.

This season Porter averaged 19 points and 7.3 rebounds per game while shooting 54.2 percent from the field and 44.5 percent from the 3-point line per game.

Jokic will put up big numbers, and Portland has dealt with that in the past and still won. The significant x-factor for me is If Porter also gets hot in this series, then the Blazers could be in trouble because they don’t have many guys who can guard him.

Portland has to stay out of foul trouble because they can’t afford to be without Nurkic, Covington, or Norman Powell for too long.

If Derrick Jones Jr. or Rondae Hollis-Jefferson have to play more for them, then that hurts their offense more than it helps the defense. Portland’s best defense this year has been their offensive firepower.

This is not a super deep Nuggets team, and the Blazers should take the same approach teams have done with them in the past with their stars and force anyone else but Jokic and Porter to beat them on the offensive end.