Jokic, Nuggets Look To Keep Win Streak Going Against Dangerous Trail Blazers

The Denver Nuggets are rolling and they will extend that when they host the Portland Trail Blazers on Tuesday, January 17 at the Ball Arena.

The Nuggets and Trail Blazers are coming off wins against the Orland Magic and the Dallas Mavericks respectively.

However, how they won was contrasting.

On one end, the Nuggets leaned on the heroics of Nikola Jokic to pull off their 119-116 victory over the Magic.

Jokic connected on a three-pointer with 1.2 seconds remaining to lift Denver to their sixth win in a row.

"He stepped back, got the space and just shot over the top," said Aaron Gordon who steered the Nuggets to victory with 25 points. "It was a beautiful shot."

The 27-year-old Serbian big man finished with another triple-double of 17 points, 14 assists, and 10 rebounds.

Aside from the 25 points, Gordon also hauled down five caroms and issued five dimes.

The Nuggets are scoring 117 points per game, the seventh most points scored per contest.

In addition, Denver is shooting 50.9% from the field, the highest team in the league right now.

On defense, Denver is surrendering 113.1 points per contest, which is 14th-least in the NBA.

Meanwhile, they are allowing the opposition to shoot 48% from the field, the 24th lowest in the league today.

But against a hot Portland quintet, the Nuggets cannot afford any slip-ups.

The Trail Blazers are coming off a whopping 140-123 beatdown of the Dallas Mavericks with Damian Lillard sizzling for 40 points.

"Any time you're coming off a tough stretch of games where you're losing, you're just searching for a win. We got one last night, a really good win," Lillard stated. "It's always tough to beat a team twice. They had a couple of guys out, but we still had to be sharp and locked in mentally regardless of who was out there."

Aside from Lillard, three other players scored 20 points each. These were Jerami Grant, Jusuf Nurkic and Anfernee Simmons.

Portland owns an adjusted offensive rating of 115, the seventh-highest rating in the league right now.

However, they need to do a better job defending, giving up 112.6 points per contest.

The Nuggets are installed as -7.5 spread favorites to prevail over the Trail Blazers with a +235 grade.

The Moneyline is -287 for Denver and +235 for Portland.

The Nuggets will be in for a tough battle on Tuesday against the Trail Blazers with tip-off set at 9:00 PM ET.

The game will be aired on the NBA League Pass and via fuboTV.