Warriors head coach Steve Kerr tried to downplay Jacque Vaughn’s significance to the Nets’ success in current weeks.
Success that continued with Brooklyn’s unpacking of a severely shorthanded Golden State roster by way of a 143-113 rout that prolonged the Nets’ successful streak to seven video games in a row and 18 wins of their final 24 outings on Wednesday evening, a mark that correlates with Nash’s dismissal and Vaughn’s promotion.
Kerr stated Brooklyn’s stretch has been nearly unequivocally because of the crew getting wholesome and never a consequence of the Nets’ midseason teaching change that despatched Kerr’s good pal Steve Nash out the door.
“It’s not a surprise to me that he’s doing well and that the team is doing well because it’s really been a matter of health,” Kerr stated on Wednesday. “Things seem to have settled down and they’ve gotten healthy. Not a surprise that they’re clicking, but Jacque deserves credit for helping them get through the storm.”
Vaughn deserves greater than credit score for serving to the Nets get by way of the storm. He needs to be an early Coach of the Year candidate for resetting the tradition in Brooklyn after it appeared all however misplaced.
Wednesday marked the second time Kerr has mentioned the Nets as they pertain to Nash’s job safety. On Nov. 1, the Warriors’ coach additionally stated coaches want “a solid situation to thrive in this league,” and roped Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra into the loop.
“You throw either one of us [Kerr or Spoelstra] in [Nash’s] situation, we wouldn’t have done any better than Steve,” Kerr stated on the time. “And that’s the truth.”
And but right here the Nets are, with Vaughn main the cost: They have been a flamable group sitting on a 2-5 file when Nash was ousted. The Nets now sit inside arms attain of the Eastern Conference’s No. 3 seed only a game-and-a-half behind Donovan Mitchell’s Cleveland Cavaliers and a bit additional behind the Milwaukee Bucks and Boston Celtics.
And wins just like the victory the Nets secured in opposition to the Warriors are precisely why Brooklyn is rolling out of vacation season on a excessive — although the crew will assuredly face a actuality verify with the aforementioned Bucks and Cavaliers subsequent up on the docket.
The Nets can’t assist that they haven’t performed championship contenders all season lengthy. Take that gripe up with the league workplace.
What they did on Wednesday evening — and what they’ve accomplished throughout this season-swinging stretch — is the place they fell quick time and time once more beneath Nash, each at first of this season and in video games taking again to his debut in Brooklyn.
They have overwhelmed lesser high quality opponents with regularity. They have approached each recreation as if it issues.
Where Nash stood on the podium speechless with no reply of the right way to get extra out of a gaggle he admitted stopped listening to him, Vaughn has challenged and demanded extra. Where Nash let one unhealthy play snowball into an prolonged run for the opponent, Vaughn calls timeout, lights into his crew, and sends them again on out onto the ground.
It occurred twice because the Nets hung a franchise file 91 factors on Golden State within the first half and yet one more time within the fourth quarter: Vaughn known as a timeout when Draymond Green acquired to the lane and dumped the ball off to Kevon Looney for a straightforward, uncontested layup. The rating was 8-4. The Nets responded by ending the primary quarter with a 46-17 lead.
He known as one other timeout when the Nets constructed a 37-point lead that the Warriors whittled all the way down to 30. Brooklyn’s lead ballooned as massive as 44.
And he known as a 3rd timeout a minute and 4 seconds into the fourth quarter — rubbish time — when Patrick Baldwin Jr. hit a 3 that despatched the Warriors on an 8-3 run that made it a 25-point recreation within the last interval. The Warriors minimize Brooklyn’s result in as little as 18 earlier than the Nets responded with back-to-back stops and back-to-back threes to place the sport again out of attain.
Save for a handful of video games through the Big Three period — specifically the unpacking of the Chicago Bulls in Brooklyn’s coming of age recreation within the 2020-21 season — the Nets have by no means regarded this good.
They are inching nearer and nearer towards well-oiled machine standing. They are proving they’re, certainly, not one in every of “them,” with “them” being the championship pretenders with delusions of grandeur.
Jordan Poole and Green have been solely two notable Warriors to swimsuit up on Wednesday. Stephen Curry is out an prolonged interval together with his first-ever shoulder damage. Klay Thompson rested within the second recreation of a back-to-back the evening after the Warriors have been completely unraveled by the New York Knicks. All-Star ahead Andrew Wiggins continues to overlook time with a groin damage. Nets star Kyrie Irving was additionally a late scratch on account of proper calf tightness.
The Warriors are usually not in fine condition. They are battered coming into the New Year and have solely performed 12 video games with a principally wholesome roster this season.
Those are the sorts of groups, nevertheless, the Nets struggled to place away in seasons previous. It’s known as the “trap game,” the place a crew favored to win by a major quantity performs all the way down to the competitors, leaving the door cracked for an undermanned or outmatched crew to steal a victory.
The Nets had tons of these beneath Nash. They have occurred with far much less frequency beneath Vaughn.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com
