Nikola Jokić, Serbian center for Denver Nuggets since 2015, team he helped win them the NBA Finals in 2023, has broken a new NBA record. He joins only two other players in NBA history to score 45+ points, 10+ rebounds, and 5+ assists in two consecutuve games. The other two players who managed that feat were Wilt Chamberlain and Elgin Baylor.
'The Joker' scored 48 points in the Nugget's huge victory against Atlanta Hawks, 111-141 However, the night before he scored a career-high 56 points, almost half his teams's points, against Washington Wizards -a team that had 16 consecutive defeats- but they lost that match 122-113.
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After Saturday's lost, the second in a row, NBA repored that Jokic joked about the need for a better motivation for the team. "In my country, where I'm coming from, after this kind of stretch, you're going to get paycheck that is a little bit less than you had hoped".
Jokić was named MVP in 2021, 2022 and 2024, and it wouldn't be shocking if he earns it a fifth time. He is by far the cornerstone of the team, which has been very uneven this season, seventh -out of 15- in the East Conference, with 12 wins and 10 losses. If it ended now, Nuggets would be a play-in team.
They also didn't qualify for NBA Cup, which begins its final phase this week.