Jamal Murray earns first career NBA Western Conference Player of the Week honor

For the first time in seven years a Nugget not named Nikola Jokic has been crowned Participant of the Week in the Western Conference Back in those prehistoric times Paul Millsap earned the weekly honor once Now the NBA has anointed Jokic s longtime running mate point guard Jamal Murray for his efforts in the first week of December The accolade doesn t mean much in a vacuum But symbolically to be saluted by the league is the latest validation of Murray s outstanding start to the season He averaged points and assists for the week in question despite spraining his ankle and being unable to finish the first of Denver s four games The Nuggets ended up going - for the week Murray returned from his minor injury with a -point performance at Indiana He was on his way to a remarkable field goal percentage for the week including a clip from -point range On the season Murray is averaging points rebounds and assists per contest to buoy the Nuggets - who have three days off to begin this week after extending their franchise-record road win streak to on Sunday He s the th-leading scorer in the Western Conference and one of four players in the NBA averaging or more points on shooting from the floor and shooting from three The other three are Jokic Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Giannis Antetokounmpo each a perennial MVP candidate Jokic has already been awarded Western Conference Player of the Week honors twice this season and Sportsman of the Month for November He has earned the weekly honor times in his career This was a career-first prize for Murray When their two stars share the court together the Nuggets have a offensive rating this season further distinguishing Jokic and Murray as one of the the majority efficient offensive duos in the history of the sport Denver s offensive rating when Jokic plays without Murray so far is points per possessions fewer Related Articles Jamal Murray is backing up preseason talk Will he be at last rewarded as an All-Star Nikola Jokic Jamal Murray lead Nuggets to franchise-record th consecutive road win Nuggets rally from down points to beat Hawks extend road winning streak Nuggets Journal For first time in Nikola Jokic s prime Denver doesn t look convincing in clutch Nikola Jokic on mission to draw -shot continuation foul I m in a shooting motion In addition to his scoring heroics in Indiana Murray spearheaded a bench unit that went on a - fourth-quarter run without Jokic s assistance last Friday It helped the Nuggets pull off their third-largest comeback win in franchise history a - conquest over the Hawks Murray finished with points assists and consecutive game-saving defensive plays a steal and a block in the last seconds He has a assist-to-turnover ratio in his last eight games another statistical uptick from his history of slow starts that have prevented him from making an All-Star squad At his current pace he s positioned himself to make it for the first time in his career this season Jokic has never had a teammate join him at All-Star weekend The Nuggets will continue to rely heavily on Murray this month with starters Aaron Gordon and Christian Braun out Both are dealing with multi-week absences due to injuries Want more Nuggets news Sign up for the Nuggets Insider to get all our NBA analysis