There wasn’t much faking it before Tim Hardaway Jr. started making it.
After going 6 for 24 (25%) from 3-point range in Denver’s five preseason games, Hardaway looked comfortable and confident as soon as the results started to matter.
“Tim cares, and he wants to win. He wants to be good,” Nikola Jokic answered a question about Hardaway’s integration after the Nuggets beat the Heat on Wednesday at Ball Arena.
“Maybe he’s faking, to be honest. I don’t know, but that’s what I see. He’s really trying to understand, trying to play the right way. I think that’s why good things are happening to him. We know that he’s a shooter. We know that he’s going to take some – I’m going to say wild shots – but he can make those. He needs to be aggressive. With his aggressiveness, he’s going to give us a different dimension.”
Hardaway is 17 for 38 (44.7%) from deep and enters Friday’s meeting against the Warriors having scored 10 or more points in five of his first seven games with the Nuggets. He was almost at his hottest against the Heat, matching his season-high with four made 3s on nine attempts. Nuggets coach David Adelman said he wanted to see Hardaway take even more 3s if he was going to get the kind of looks he did Wednesday.
“They’re going to be open. They’re going to be contested. They’re going to be some fly-bys where I pump fake and take one dribble. They’re all the same,” Hardaway said of the looks he’s getting so far. “I just got to go out there and do my job and knock down the shot.”
The 33-year-old has been Denver’s sixth man to start the season, so his minutes have been split between the starters and second unit. The spacing he provides is valuable whether he’s sharing the court with a unit anchored by Jokic or Jonas Valanciunas.
“A lot of teams have the athleticism these days – Miami included – to really load up on the weak side and still get out and get a great contest, but a guy that releases the ball that quickly and gets it off, it’s a big deal,” Adelman said. “Not to mention, he really knows how to play. This is a group of guys you would love to play pickup with. Tim’s one of those guys. He fits right in.”
That quick release was on display early against Miami. It looked like Miami had secured a defensive rebound with the game tied at 33 in the final seconds of the first quarter, but Bruce Brown deflected a pass in Hardaway’s direction. It took the veteran roughly one second to reach to his right and grab the ball, get his feet squared and release a 3 that splashed through the net with zeroes on the clock.
“It’s just repetition after repetition, man. Once you’ve been in this league for a long time and a lot of guys know your game, you’ve got to find ways to get your shot off, get your footsteps right before you release the shot,” Hardaway said of his quick trigger. “I just tried to stick the form, so I could make sure I had an opportunity to get it over the front of the rim.”
That hasn’t been an issue since the preseason. Playing alongside Jokic, Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon comes with a steady diet of open shots for the floor spacers. It also comes with the expectation those shots are made at a high clip. There doesn’t appear to be anything fake about Hardaway’s ability to fill that role.
“They gravitate a lot of energy towards them,” Hardaway said.
“In order for them to have space and room to operate, us guys got to do our job and knock down our shots when open or when available and keep the defense honest so they can go out and do what they do best.”
