Nikola Jokic very nearly gave the Denver Nuggets a 3-1 lead over the Phoenix Suns in their second-round series on Sunday. In 39 minutes, Jokic scored 53 points on 20 of 30 shooting. He dished out 11 assists and pulled down four rebounds in the process, but ultimately his team fell just short. When the dust settled, the Suns emerged with a 129-124 victory and a series tied at two games apiece.
History will remember Game 4 as such, and naturally, the spoils will go to the victor. Devin Booker had yet another scorcher and is well on his way to a historic offensive postseason. Kevin Durant was nearly as good, and together, the duo is lifting an otherwise broken roster up to the level of the Western Conference's No. 1 seed. Just don't blame that on Jokic. His team might have lost on Sunday, but his overall performance was among the best we've ever seen in a postseason defeat. Here are some numbers to prove it:
- Only 47 players had ever scored 50 points in a playoff game entering Sunday. Of those 47, just 10 had lost. Jokic was No. 11. With 53 points, he just had the fourth-highest scoring effort in a playoff loss in NBA history, joining Donovan Mitchell and Damian Lillard... who both lost their 50-point games against Jokic himself, and Michael Jordan.
- Only 18 players had ever recorded a 50-point double-double in the playoffs entering Sunday. Jokic became No. 19, but was just the fifth to lose the game. He is again joined by Lillard, as well as Russell Westbrook, Billy Cunningham, and Jokic's own teammate, Jamal Murray.
- Only nine players had ever made two-thirds of their shots in a 50-point playoff game entering Sunday. Jokic made it an even 10, but was only the second ever to lose. The first? If you've been keeping up, you can guess that the answer is Lillard.
Lillard is the name that keeps coming up here, and he is probably the answer from a statistical perspective. In fact, according to John Hollinger's game score metric, Lillard had the greatest playoff game in NBA history regardless of outcome. That game, a 2021 battle with Denver that went into two overtimes, ended in Lillard's defeat despite 55 points on 12 made 3-pointers. Jokic's game score was far lower at 42.4. That would still rank his loss as the 30th-best playoff performance in NBA history and the seventh-best in a loss, but it falls behind Lillard due to turnovers, a lack of rebounds and Lillard's 3-point barrage.
In context, it misses out on a few others as well. LeBron James technically had a lower game score in Game 1 of the 2018 NBA Finals, for example, but he was playing against arguably the greatest roster ever assembled in the last round of the playoffs. Even if it wasn't quite as statistically excellent, the context of the moment makes it hard to argue with one of the finest games James ever played.
Yet Jokic definitively earned himself a spot on the short list, and it would be historic even if he'd won it. Denver lost this game during their bench minutes. The Nuggets used three reserves in Game 4. All three of them had a point-differential of at least minus-10. Booker and the Suns ultimately got just enough from their role players to eke out a victory. Jokic and the Nuggets didn't, and while they'd certainly prefer to have the win, Jokic's place among history's greatest losers is at least a tiny consolation prize. In no way, shape or form could this defeat be blamed on him.
