Top seed? Maybe not. But Nuggets have eye on standings as home stretch begins: “Every game matters”

Jalen Pickett informed Jamal Murray of the updated Western Conference standings on the bench.

Memphis had lost. The Nuggets were tied for second place for the moment. They were in the middle of a game. Their result against Charlotte would determine whether they ended Thursday night in second or third.

“I was like, ‘We’ve gotta win this game.’ And everybody was locked in, and we won the game,” Murray said. “So I think it’s just those little reminders.”

Murray went on to score 34 points as Denver began the stretch run of the regular season with a 129-115 win. One game after the All-Star break, the Nuggets (37-19) have ascended to the No. 2 seed for the first time all season, leading the Grizzlies by half a game. Murray, perhaps getting ahead of himself just a little, even set his sights on the first-place Thunder.

“I like the motivation of the team right now,” he said, “just trying to get that 1-seed.”

That might be out of reach. Oklahoma City (44-10) has an eight-game cushion with fewer than 30 remaining for both teams. Still, considering the cluster behind the Thunder, Murray’s hungry mindset could be a mandate for the Nuggets if they want to protect their new position. They’re still only three games ahead of the fifth-place Lakers, who visit Saturday. Falling to fifth would mean forfeiting home-court advantage in the first round.

“The standings are gonna be probably changing every single day as we move forward,” coach Michael Malone said, “but we just have to worry about us.”

It is undoubtedly that time of year, when it becomes a nightly hobby in NBA locker rooms to check the standings before and after games.

But 2024 was a cautionary tale for the Nuggets. They pushed hard in pursuit of home-court advantage in the Western Conference playoffs. They conceded the top seed with a painful loss to San Antonio in their 81st game. Then they salvaged second place over Minnesota on the last day of the regular season, only to lose three out of four home games to Minnesota in a second-round playoff series. Nikola Jokic and company stalled out in the middle of Game 7.

The extent to which Denver steps on the gas in these next 26 games will be intriguing.

“No matter who you play in the West, man, it’s gonna be a dogfight,” Malone said. “Think about the teams that are outside the play-in right now. … There’s no, like, ‘Let’s get this seed so we can play this team.’ OK. Careful what you wish for. So we’ll continue to go about our business, but we’re not gonna try to win the battle and wind up losing the war. We’ve gotta be smart about that as we approach these final games and make sure we have enough in the tank for a deep run.”

Malone has a difficult needle to thread managing his players’ minutes. Fourteen of Denver’s last 26 games are against top-six playoff seeds (as of Friday’s standings), and six more are against play-in teams. Five back-to-backs remain, including a pair of road games in Oklahoma City.

“We want to start to build,” Aaron Gordon said. “… You want to be playing your best basketball in April, May and June. Now is the time to make that climb.”

“Just being in this position so many times, it’s like, every game matters,” Murray said. “This is probably one of the easier games that we’re gonna have for the rest of the season. First one out of the break. Team that’s not in the playoffs. … Just gotta be ready to play. It’s not gonna come down to Xs and Os. It’s just who’s more ready to play and who wants to win more. That’s what I think it comes down to.”