PHILADELPHIA — The Nuggets botched their plan for a tricky East Coast back-to-back.
They pushed all their chips to the center of the table Sunday in the first leg. They brought back Aaron Gordon and Christian Braun from prolonged injury absences. They played Jamal Murray for 40 minutes. They played Tim Hardaway Jr. for 34 off the bench.
They lost in Brooklyn anyway.
The sting of that loss was amplified by the domino effect of their decision to go all in. Denver is resting Murray, Hardaway, Gordon and Braun for the second leg of the back-to-back Monday in Philadelphia, bringing the total number of unavailable rotation players to seven.