On Saturday evening, the Denver Nuggets absorbed one of their most painful defeats of the season — an overtime road loss to the Los Angeles Lakers. The Nuggets looked poised to close out the game in regulation, but Lakers guard Austin Reaves delivered a jaw-dropping sequence: a perfectly intentional missed free throw, followed by his own rebound and a game-tying put-back that sent the contest into extra time.
After the final buzzer, Nuggets head coach David Adelman broke down the exact sequence in vivid detail.
“That’s just one of those things that’s one in 100 in the NBA,” Adelman said, per Bennett Durando of the Denver Post on X. “It happened. You give them credit. But there were so many things that led up to that that we could have done differently, maybe better.”
Adelman’s post-game explanation painted a clear picture of how Reaves manufactured the heroics: the deliberate miss, the perfectly timed crash to the glass, and the uncontested finish in a paint that Denver left momentarily vacant. While the coach gave full credit to the Lakers guard for executing a rare play, he also pointed to multiple missed opportunities earlier in the sequence that allowed the dramatic turnaround.
Some analysts immediately zeroed in on Denver’s rebounding setup, noting the Nuggets did not station a fourth defender along the lane for Reaves’ second free throw. The ball caromed cleanly into an open area of the paint — real estate that could have been occupied had Denver adjusted its box-out scheme.
The loss instantly dampened the positive momentum from Denver’s solid recent road win over the San Antonio Spurs (minus Victor Wembanyama). It was an especially rough night for Jamal Murray, who finished with just five points and fouled out — a complete reversal from the dominance he has historically shown against the Lakers.
Despite the setback, the Nuggets sit at 41-27 and remain just a game and a half ahead of the Phoenix Suns in the race to avoid the Western Conference play-in tournament.
Denver now gets a couple of days to regroup before returning home on Tuesday night to face the Philadelphia 76ers.