David Adelman calls Lu Dort play a 'cheap shot,' Thunder's response 'ridiculous' 2 days later

Bennett Durando, The Denver Post on Mar 1, 2026

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DENVER — With 36 hours of distance from Nikola Jokic’s altercation with the Oklahoma City Thunder, David Adelman had a much stronger opinion on the play that sparked it than he initially did.

In particular, he and the Denver Nuggets weren’t thrilled by Thunder coach Mark Daigneault’s dismissive postgame attitude about the flagrant two foul that earned Luguentz Dort an ejection.

Adelman called Dort’s trip of Jokic a “cheap shot” and Oklahoma City’s reaction “ridiculous” during his pregame news conference before Denver hosted Minnesota on Sunday afternoon.

Dort stuck out his right leg to trip Jokic while he was jogging up the court Friday in Oklahoma City. The Serbian big man took exception, angrily confronting Dort then exchanging shoves with Thunder center Jaylin Williams. Jokic said after the game that it was a “necessary reaction by me” to “an unnecessary move” by Dort. After the Nuggets lost in overtime, Adelman said he needed to rewatch the play.

Back at home Sunday, he was asked about the display of fiery intensity from Jokic, whose demeanor is usually more stoic.

“He’s more a measured person throughout the season, because I mean, most people are more productive if they’re measured,” Adelman said. “But there’s a point where we play these games and what he deals with nightly, anybody would react that way. And then for Dort to take that shot — and then I guess it wasn’t that big of a deal from their standpoint, how they looked at it — is ridiculous. That was malicious. It was a cheap shot. Lu Dort’s a great player, and that’s not what I’ve seen him do before. But at some point, you have to stand up for yourself.”

The OKC “standpoint” referenced by Adelman was the one expressed by Daigneault after the game. He described the incident as “just great competitors” reaching a boiling point near the end of a chippy game, saying “it was nothing more than that.” Dort was not made available for comment by the Thunder. Daigneault also seemed to scrutinize the decision to eject Dort and declined to answer a follow-up question.

“If a player (for us), if J-Will is running up the floor and gets tripped, we expect a flagrant two from this point forward. That’s all,” Daigneault said. “If that’s the precedent, if that becomes a malicious play and flagrant two is the line in the sand on that, we would expect that if it’s J-Will. We would expect that if it’s anybody.”

Jokic and Williams received matching technical fouls for the altercation but were allowed to stay in the game. The Nuggets visit Oklahoma City again on March 9.

“Nikola, that’s who he is, man,” Adelman said Sunday. “You can’t have the success that he’s had and not be that competitive.”

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