In a span of 10 minutes, Julian Strawther pushed the Nuggets across the finish line of a do-or-die Game 6 in the Western Conference semifinals last spring.
He was a stab in the dark for then-interim coach David Adelman, who spent the 2025 playoffs cycling through Denver’s bench in search of viable depth. Strawther scored 14 combined points in the first five games against Oklahoma City. But in a series the Nuggets ultimately lost, he cemented himself as an unlikely hero in front of a nervous, then ecstatic Ball Arena crowd with a 15-point explosion.