October 25, 2026 at 5:04 AM UTC

Postgame Report

Nuggets Score 141 to Beat Pelicans and Get First Win

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Denver, short-handed and 0-1, beat a winless New Orleans team 141-135 at Ball Arena for its first win of the season.

The Nuggets did it without much of their depth. Cameron Johnson, Julian Strawther and Spencer Jones were all ruled out before tipoff, and Alpha Diallo was listed as questionable, so Denver's rotation was thinner than coach Michael Malone would have liked. The Nuggets still beat the Pelicans 141-135 at Ball Arena on Saturday night.

The score is the first thing to look at, given how the week began. Denver opened the season with a 96-84 loss to Oklahoma City in which it was outscored by 16 points in the second half and finished with only 84. Putting 141 on New Orleans answers that. The Pelicans scored 135 themselves, so the margin was six points, and the game was never decided by defense.

New Orleans was on the second night of a back-to-back, the kind of spot where a team's legs tend to go late in a high-possession game. The Pelicans kept scoring, but they could not get the stops to close the gap or take the lead.

That leaves both teams where the night began, in different spots. The Pelicans fall to 0-3 after a third straight loss to open the year. Denver is 1-1 and avoids back-to-back losses, and it got its first home game out of the way with a win.

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