Reflecting on a tumultuous 2022 calendar 12 months, famous person ahead Kevin Durant stated the Nets are lastly taking part in the sort of basketball the group has strived for since he and Kyrie Irving arrived in Brooklyn in the summertime of 2019.
“It was one of those years you reflect on, and you see the turning points in the organization,” Durant stated after sitting all the fourth quarter within the Nets’ wire-to-wire victory over the Charlotte Hornets on New Year’s Eve. “You see the totally different moments that introduced us collectively as a gaggle. At this level now in the direction of the tip of the 12 months, you begin to see us come collectively and kind what we’ve been seeking to do these final couple of years which is a stable staff that performs arduous each evening.
“So we went through a lot this calendar year, but we looking for bigger and better things in 2023.”
The Nets prolonged their league-best successful streak to 11 video games with their 123-106 victory over the Hornets on Saturday. They have gained 18 of their final 21 video games and are 22-7 since Jacque Vaughn changed Steve Nash as head coach after the primary seven video games of the season.
Durant named the teaching change as one in every of a number of turning factors in a roller-coaster trip of a calendar 12 months that included quite a few commerce requests, quite a few absences for Irving and a Nets season that ended through a first-round sweep by the Boston Celtics in final 12 months’s playoffs.
The very considered a championship-contending Nets staff hung in jeopardy when twice Durant requested a commerce throughout the offseason, together with one reported demand that included each Nash and basic supervisor Sean Marks be fired.
“For us to be able to bring the group back together and start the year was cool, and then once Jacque became the coach and we started to move forward then obviously that was a turning point for us,” Durant stated. “Then we had some stuff that wasn’t perfect: guys out the lineup, Kyrie out the lineup, James Harden demanding a commerce, it was lots of stuff that we went by way of.
“How we started the year from an outside perspective, the noise around our team, so it’s good that we can be about ball going into the new year and we’re playing a solid brand right now, so that’s the most important thing.”
Irving declined the chance to mirror on the season.
“Everyday is still being written, so I don’t think a year in reflecting is necessary right now, but we just want to continue putting our best foot forward for one another and more importantly for ourselves as professionals,” he stated. “So just want to continue to be consistent, stay focused and disciplined.”
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Source: www.bostonherald.com