In Murray’s comeback, Jokic’s triple-double leads the Nuggets beat the Rockets 134-124.

Denver — On Wednesday night, in Jamal Murray’s comeback from a hamstring injury, the Denver Nuggets defeated the Houston Rockets 134-124 behind 32 points, 15 assists, and 10 rebounds from Nikola Jokic and a season-high 30 points from Michael Porter Jr.
Murray, who had not played in Denver’s previous 11 games, scored 16 points. The Nuggets were only 6-5 without their point guard after beginning the game 6-1 with Murray available.

With 19 made 3-pointers and 37 assists to just three mistakes, Denver’s offensive performance was among its finest of the season thanks to his presence.

“One of the security guards said, ‘Hey, great win tonight.’ I said it was a great outcome,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said. “I wouldn’t call it a great win. It was a great outcome.”

It was the third consecutive win for the NBA champion Nuggets, who had lost four of five before their current streak.

Jokic, who was sidelined with a lower back injury in a win Monday at the Los Angeles Clippers, recorded his seventh triple-double of the season. Entering the night, all other NBA players had combined for just eight triple-doubles.

This is pretty easy basketball when you’ve got someone that good with the floater, but also that good at passing,” said Porter, who had 10 rebounds and made seven of his 12 3s.

Denver had lost twice to the Rockets in November, including a 19-point loss in Houston five days earlier. The Nuggets improved their NBA-best home record to 9-0 while dropping the Rockets to 0-7 on the road.

While Murray returned, Denver was without forward Aaron Gordon, who missed his third consecutive game with a strained right heel.

Welcomed with a roaring “He’s back!” from the public address announcer and a hearty ovation from the home crowd before tip-off, Murray injured his ankle after he came down awkwardly on a missed contested shot at the rim two minutes into the game and walked gingerly back to the bench after a Nuggets timeout. He immediately returned out of the timeout and finished with 22 minutes played, though he described his ankle injury as “frustrating.”

“The hamstring’s fine,” Murray said. “I’ve worked enough to get it back to strength. Now, it’s just another thing. I’ve got to work on that and hopefully I’ll be ready.”

After that initial scare, his team had little reason to worry the rest of the night.

Led by 12 points from Porter, the Nuggets scored a season-high 41 points in the first quarter and led by as many as 19 in the period. Denver never trailed and led by double digits for all but the opening 4:16 against a Houston team that was playing the second night of a back-to-back after a loss Tuesday night at the Dallas Mavericks.

Rockets guard Jalen Green stated, “We simply woke up pretty late.” It would have been a different story if we had gotten off to a somewhat better start.

With 26 points, including 18 in the third quarter when he converted all six of his field goals and all four of his 3-pointers, Green led the Rockets. Houston, which had a surprising 6-3 start, lost for the fifth time in seven games despite 22 points from Alperen Sengun.

Due to a sprained left thumb, guard Fred VanVleet—the team’s third-leading scorer and a $130 million offseason acquisition—was not available for play for the Rockets.