The only two Denver Nuggets hitting more than half their shots Tuesday against the Los Angeles Clippers couldn’t get a shot to go with the game on the line.

The Nuggets got a look at a game-winner and a game-extender in the final seconds of an 87-85 loss, a game they led by 25 in the third quarter, but both Nikola Jokic and Aaron Gordon came up just short.

Jokic took what could have been the game-winning 3-pointer in the final seconds.

“To be honest, I knew it was short when I released it.” Jokic said. “Is it a good shot? Yeah, I will take that shot.”

Gordon grabbed the offensive rebound and put up a 15-footer that rimmed out in the same motion just before the buzzer. Gordon finished with 30 points, making 11 of his 16 shots from the field and all nine of his free throws, to go with 12 rebounds.

“He played really well,” Jokic said. “He was attacking the paint. He lived in the paint and helped us a lot.”

Jokic hit 9 of 14 shots and added 21 points, 13 rebounds and eight assists. The rest of the Nuggets combined to go 12 for 50.

“Thank goodness for Nikola and Aaron,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said.

“Everybody else, obviously, really struggled to make shots tonight.”

The execution throughout the night, Malone said, was a big part of why he didn’t call a timeout when Jokic grabbed a defensive rebound with 7.5 seconds left. In addition to the poor shooting, Denver turned it over 20 times, leading to 22 of the Clippers’ points.

“Our execution was piss poor, so if we called timeout, we would have been doing them a favor. We probably wouldn’t have gotten the ball inbounds the way things were going for us,” Malone said.

“I just felt we were going to have a much better chance of getting a good look by just letting them flow.”

Neither team could buy a bucket early. The Nuggets missed their first 10 3-pointers but led 41-28 at halftime after holding the Clippers, which went 1 of 14 from 3-point range in the first half, to 12 points in the second quarter.

Denver extended its lead to 25 midway through third quarter, but the Clippers closed within 11 points to start the fourth quarter.

“Their zone got us really, really tentative,” Malone said. “And then we weren’t getting back in transition to top it all off.”

Reggie Jackson gave the Clippers their first lead since the opening minutes with a 3-pointer midway through the fourth before the Nuggets reclaimed the lead on back-to-back buckets from Jokic.

Amir Coffey, who led the Clippers with 18 points, gave the hosts the lead for good with 2:30 remaining. Denver’s two leading scorers on the night had shots to reverse the result, but their rare misses were not the issue.

“It should have never come down to that,” Malone said. “First half, I thought our defense was great. Second half, it was awful.”

Starting guard Will Barton III missed the game in the league’s health and safety protocols. Austin Rivers started in Barton’s place and finished with four points, all free throws, a day after he was taken to a Los Angeles hospital, experiencing what Malone described pregame as an allergic reaction. Malone said Rivers was released Monday night and woke up Tuesday feeling good enough to play.

“I have no idea what caused the reaction, but any time you have a hard time breathing, that is a scary incident,” Malone said.

The Nuggets are scheduled to begin their longest homestand of the season Thursday against Portland, the first of six straight games at Ball Arena.