The Twin Peaks?
The Monster Match?
The Godzilla Brothers?
“The Godzilla Brothers,” Nuggets center JaVale McGee repeated, pondering the epithet with a grin.
What say you, JaVale? What do we call a pairing of the 7-foot McGee and 6-11 All-Star center Nikola Jokic, together rocking the same front court? Other than, you know, awesome?
“I don’t know yet,” McGee answered late Thursday night after the two Denver big men powered the Nuggets to a 114-103 win at Minnesota.
“We’ve got to think about the name. We can’t just jump into a name. It’s a trademark, so we’ve got to make sure we select the right name.”
Whatever nickname you want to assign the combo of Jokic and McGee in the same starting five, it sure worked like a dream in Minneapolis.
In the duo’s first start together since McGee was acquired at the trade deadline from Cleveland, the Joker dropped 31 points, 14 rebounds and four assists on the hapless Timberwolves. McGee finished with 12 points and 13 rebounds, notching his first double-double since Nov. 29, 2019.
“It felt like us both being (in the starting lineup) at the same time is a great tandem, especially on the rebounding aspect,” said McGee, who helped the Nuggets collect 39 offensive boards and outrebound the hosts 53-43 on the evening.
“We feel like we just tap into each other, trying to get offensive rebounds and defensive rebound, and it’s an amazing feeling.”
As the final week of the regular season wraps up and with the Nuggets already locked into a top-4 NBA playoffs seed, this last pre-postseason road trip, which continues Friday in Detroit against the 20-50 Pistons, offers coach Michael Malone a chance to rest some players — forward Michael Porter Jr. had Thursday off — while experimenting with others.
At the moment, the Nuggets are deepest, and healthiest, at center and power forward, so Malone went with a king-sized lineup at the Twin Cities. The coach stuck with 6-foot-8 Aaron Gordon (15 points, four assists) as the starting small forward while veteran bruisers Paul Millsap (five points, seven boards, five assists) and JaMychal Green (three points, four assists) helped to steady an otherwise young second unit.
“I think it was great,” Malone said of the Jokic-McGee pairing. “Overall, I thought those guys played off each other pretty well.”
Good enough to consider for a postseason sequel?
“Yeah, I think we can go to a lot of different options as we approach the playoffs … we can try some more different things,” Malone said. “Obviously, the playoffs are really about matchups — is it a big team, is it a small team? We knew … they’d be able to play together.”
In the 24 minutes that Jokic and McGee shared the floor, the Timberwolves shot 44.4% from the field, were outrebounded 35-17 and got three shots blocked — with two of those swats coming from McGee.
In other words, that “Godzilla Brothers” look just might be one worth circling back to.
“I definitely think this could be a lineup in the future,” McGee said. “Especially with teams that play two bigs. I definitely feel like it gives Joker some time off his legs at the defensive end, when he has to guard (a big), assuming that big (is a) scorer … I can guard him and he doesn’t have to worry about anything. He can just do what he does on offense.”
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Nikola Jokic and JaVale McGee give Nuggets’ “Godzilla” lineup some serious teeth - The Denver Post
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