The Denver Nuggets and Toronto Raptors were one step closer to the final of the Western and Eastern Conference, respectively, by winning their games on Tuesday against the Portland Trail Blazers and the Philadelphia 76ers.
At the end of the day in the NBA playoffs, the Nuggets subdued the Blazers 124-98 to put their Western 3-2 semifinal in their favor.
The team that wins Game 5 has an 82% chance of winning the series.
The next game in this series – the best of seven games – will be Thursday in Portland. It could end if the Nuggets win.
Inspired by the excellent performances of the Serbian Nikola Jokic and Paul Millsap, who totaled 24 points the first and 25 points with a whopping 19 rebounds the second, Denver got the important victory.
The Nuggets went to the locker room at halftime already with a sizable 65-47 lead.
Meanwhile, the Blazers could not find a way to stop the offensive waste of the Nuggets, who at the end of the third period had increased the advantage to 28 points (93-65).
Jokic was a lock in the painted area to the point of dominating with 19 balls recovered in the rebounding fight.
The winner of this series will go in the Western Conference final against the winner of the semifinal between the Houston Rockets and defending champion Golden State Warriors, which is tied 2-2.
– Toronto overwhelms –
Previously, in Toronto, Canada, the Raptors beat the Philadelphia 76ers 125-89 and also led 3-2 in their Eastern Conference semifinal series.
The next game will be on Thursday in Philadelphia, where the Raptors will end the series if they win.
The Raptors had six players with double figures with Cameroonian Pascal Siakam and Kawhi Leonard as their top scorers with 25 and 21 points, respectively.
Siakam also contributed eight rebounds and Leonard 12, while point guard Kyle Lowry finished with 19 points, Danny Green with 17, Spanish Marc Gasol with 11 and Spanish-Congolese Serge Ibaka with 10.
For the Sixers, the shooting man was Jimmy Butler with 22, followed by Tobias Harris with 15.
While Siakam had already accumulated 15 points and Leonard nine in the first half of the game, the duo of excellent canasteros from Philadelphia, the Cameroonian Joel Embiid and the Australian Ben Simmons, was the victim of the fierce defense of the Canadian team.
Embiid and Simmons had hitherto five points each. Embiid, who went blank in the second quarter, finished with 13 and the Australian was seven.
Toronto went into the break with a wide 21-point lead (64-43), thanks to four goals from Leonard in the last minute of that stretch.
At the end of the third quarter, Toronto was leading 92-70, thanks in part to their 3-point shooting ERA, with 11 (33 points) in 30 attempts so far.
Finally, the Raptors made 16 of three points in 40 innings, while Philadelphia only managed 6 of 24.
Shotgunner Danny Green led the Toronto snipers with 5 triples (15 points).
With six minutes to go, the management of the Canadian team decided to seat the starters Leonard, Siakam, Green and point guard Lowry, since they had a 105-74 advantage.
Ibaka played a large part of the game with three points on the forehead due to an elbow from his teammate Leonard in the rebounding fight.
The winner of this series will go to the final of the Eastern Conference against the winner of the semifinal between Boston Celtics and Milwaukee Bucks, which favors the latter 3-1. AFP