Nuggets on a roll heading into matchup with Lakers

LOS ANGELES -- The Denver Nuggets have put together one of their best stretches of basketball this season. The Nuggets will attempt to continue their solid play when they face the Los Angeles Lakers on Tuesday night at Staples Center.

The Nuggets (21-25) are riding a three-game winning streak after a 123-112 win over the Phoenix Suns in their last outing Saturday despite playing without star forward Nikola Jokic. Jokic sustained a strained hip flexor in Thursday's 127-120 victory over the Suns. He is listed as day-to-day.

Jokic had been on a roll recently until coming up lame. He is averaging 23.9 points, 11.1 rebounds and 4.9 assists in January. Jokic is shooting 60.6 percent from the floor. He is one of the reasons the Nuggets have captured seven of their past nine contests.

In his absence, though, the Nuggets relied on the hot hand of forward Danilo Gallinari, who scored a season-high 32 points against the Suns.

"So without Nikola Jokic, who we put the ball in his hands so much, who's hands are you going to put the ball in? That's Gallo," Nuggets coach Mike Malone told the Denver Post. "Gallo has been a go-to player for most of his career, and he showed you that he's still a heck of a player."

Gallinari took the praise in stride.

"The focus was to get a win," Gallinari told the Post. "I have to be, to bring it every night like this, be aggressive and try to open up space for my teammates and go to the free throw line. I thought I was able to do that pretty well."

The Lakers are mired in a three-game skid after a 96-88 setback Saturday at the Utah Jazz. That win allowed the Jazz to sweep the season series between the two for the first time.

Los Angeles (16-34) has dropped eight of its last nine contests and can't find any consistency, particularly on defense where they rank among the NBA's worse clubs.

However, the Lakers remain upbeat.

"Even when we got down by 10, we still felt like we were in the game," Lakers guard Jordan Clarkson said after the loss to the Jazz, according to the Los Angeles Times. "Last year we used to get down by 10, 20 we thought we were going to get our (butt) whooped. But now we know we're back in here competing. We're still competing, most times we're in games to win. We just gotta figure out how to finish games."

Against Utah, the Lakers played without forward Julius Randle, who was diagnosed with pneumonia. Randle is listed as questionable for Tuesday's game.

Point guard D'Angelo Russell, who has missed the last three games with a mild MCL sprain of his right knee and a strained right calf, also is listed as questionable.

This is the second of three meetings between the clubs. Denver earned a 127-121 decision over the Lakers on Jan. 17, the last time they faced each other at Staples. A strong second-half performance by the Nuggets helped them bolt to a double-digit advantage before holding off a late Lakers' run.

The Nuggets have won three straight over Los Angeles.