The Denver Nuggets worked all season to earn home court advantage as they were in search of back to back NBA titles, but on Sunday night they were knocked out in the second round by the Minnesota Timberwolves, who won game seven in Denver, 98-90.
Minnesota won three of the four games in Denver in the series.
The Timberwolves trailed by as many as 20 points in the game and they overcame a 15 point halftime deficit to dethrone Denver.
A lack of scoring outside the big two a major reason why. Nikola Jokic finished with 35 points and Jamal Murray scored 34 but the Nuggets next highest scorer was Michael Porter Jr, who finished with just seven points.
Denver became the fifth straight defending champion to fail to reach the Conference Finals the following season.
Minnesota will match up with the Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference Finals while in the East it’ll be Boston playing Indiana.
