SAN ANTONIO — About 20 minutes after the Nuggets had seized control of their first-round series against the Spurs, Jamal Murray stood outside of the interview room Saturday spinning a basketball on his finger and tossing bounce passes off the wall in the corridors of the AT&T Center.

Evidently, he hadn’t feasted enough during the Nuggets’ rollicking second-half surge in Game 4.

Murray was paramount to their 117-103 win — Denver’s first in San Antonio since 2012 — and any chance the Nuggets had in wresting back control of this series laid in the hands of their third-year point guard.

With momentum teetering in the third quarter and the Nuggets up 71-69, Murray’s 3-pointer and ferocious dunk stretched the lead to 76-69. The energy changed, and the margin never got closer than five points the rest of the game.

“It happened so fast,” said Murray, who finished with 24 points and six assists. “I remember the sequence, but I was like … I didn’t even see the dunk. I haven’t seen it yet.”

J-A-M[AL MURRAY]#MileHighBasketball pic.twitter.com/OgqKfG4syO

— Denver Nuggets (@nuggets) April 20, 2019

Murray’s backdoor dunk was the crescendo of a 37-point quarter, which saw Denver’s three most valuable players deflate any hope of a Spurs victory and change the trajectory of the series. Nikola Jokic scored 11 of his game-high 29 points in the period, and Torrey Craig, starting in place of Will Barton, drilled two of his five 3-pointers. The Nuggets hit 15 3-pointers as a team, which countered their abysmal 37 percent shooting in the first half.

“(Jamal) needs such a little trigger to step on another level, and when he steps on another level, he just brings us all with him,” Jokic said. “He’s our point guard, he’s our leader on the floor, he’s our general, so when he has great energy, we just follow him.”

Murray’s defense drew the brunt of criticism after Spurs point guard Derrick White went off for a career-high 36 points in Game 3. Multiple players said they took his game — and the way the Spurs had imposed their will on the Nuggets — personally. As a result, Nuggets coach Michael Malone switched up his team’s defensive assignments. Murray drew Spurs guard Bryn Forbes, while Gary Harris took White. It was Craig who was left to nag DeMar DeRozan.

White managed just eight points while committing four turnovers. DeRozan was flustered into 19 points and an ejection. Forbes scored an inconsequential 10 points.

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“I thought (Jamal) was a lot more engaged, I thought he played a lot harder, played with a lot more urgency,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said. “I’m not surprised because we all know what Derrick White did last game.”

Denver’s win is a monumental step for this group, most of whom are taking in the postseason for the first time. Think about what they learned throughout the course of four days in steamy San Antonio. Their defense got exposed in Game 3; they had their toughness questioned by their coach; they were taught the difference between regular- season and postseason fouls; and they weathered another awful first quarter in Game 4 to steal home-court advantage right back.

As the Nuggets exhaled on the plane back to Denver, not only could they rest easy with the knowledge that two wins at Pepsi Center means they’ll advance to the second round, they could take solace in the fact that this group has now won on the road in the postseason. That knowledge will pay untold dividends as far as they go this season — and in future runs.

“I just feel like we’ve seen it all at a young age so far,” Murray said. “Going to the playoffs is a big experience for us, and we’re all learning on the fly.”

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