For three quarters, the Nets gave the followers what they wished.
A victory for a championship contender is meant to really feel dominant. It’s presupposed to really feel easy. It’s presupposed to take away any shadow of a doubt as to which of the 2 competing groups is best.
A victory for a championship contender ought to nearly really feel unopposed.
And for 3 quarters, the Nets regarded like an unopposed title fighter, punching down on a lot lesser competitors in an eventual 115-108 win over Cleveland to clinch the Eastern Conference’s No. 7 seed. They ripped the Cavaliers to shreds early after which allowed Tuesday’s play-in recreation to show into a well-known recreation of sizzling potato.
First it was Kyrie Irving’s flip to eat, then it was Kevin Durant’s, then Andre Drummond or Bruce Brown.
And then the wheels fell off halfway via the third quarter. The Nets constructed a 22-point lead, then watched the Cavaliers chop into that lead.
Twenty. Seventeen. Fourteen. Twelve. The Cavaliers minimize the Nets’ lead all the way in which down to 6 with 5 minutes to go within the fourth quarter.
But the Nets have been right here earlier than. In truth, they’ve been right here extra instances than Durant would favor.
Blown leads are nearly intertwined into the material of the Nets’ DNA. They construct leads, take their toes off the gasoline, then ramp it up — no pun supposed — when the sport will get too shut.
It occurred after they blew an 18-point lead towards the Indiana Pacers, after they blew a 17-point lead towards the Houston Rockets, when the league-worst Pistons turned a 10-point Nets lead right into a 12-point benefit of their very own, and it occurred in final week’s matchup towards the Cavaliers.
The Nets led by 17 on the finish of the primary quarter and located themselves in a tie recreation within the fourth quarter earlier than pulling away to win by 11.
The solely factor totally different on Tuesday evening had been the stakes.
A loss on Tuesday would have been devastating. It would have despatched the Nets from a solidified matchup towards the second-seeded Boston Celtics right into a win-or-go-home comfort showdown towards the winner of the No. 9-10 recreation between the Charlotte Hornets and Atlanta Hawks.
A loss, nevertheless, would have been par from the course. This is who the Nets are. They may play with their meals, and it may not at all times be fairly, however they deal with enterprise when it issues most.
That’s as a result of they’re led by two gamers who’ve received all of it earlier than, and a cool, calm and picked up head coach in Steve Nash, who may not be the perfect tactician amongst his friends, however continues to maintain this workforce striving for incremental enchancment on a nightly foundation.
Irving made every of his first 11 photographs and completed with 34 factors on 12-of-15 capturing to go together with 10 assists. Durant shot 9-of-16 from the sphere for 25 factors and 11 assists. The duo grew to become the primary pair of Nets teammates to file 20-plus factors and 10-plus assists since Derrick Coleman and Rumeal Robinson again in 1993.
And they proceed to maintain this workforce on the best path, even when the going will get robust, even within the face of adversity, even when one other workforce’s run seems to be prefer it may swing the momentum out of their favor.
More importantly, the victory reaffirms the assumption that this Nets workforce can activate the jets when they should, that they’ll flip the change from a workforce ostensibly cruising via the common season to 1 able to energy via the post-season and probably upset a higher-seeded opponent.
The Nets can’t afford many missteps towards the Celtics. Boston is house to the league’s finest protection. It’s house to Jayson Tatum, an outright star who hung 54 factors on the Nets the final time these two groups met. It’s house to Marcus Smart, a frontrunner for Defensive Player of the Year. And it’s house to Ime Udoka, one in every of Nash’s former assistants who has turn into a Coach of the Year candidate by turning the Celtics into an Eastern Conference juggernaut.
But the Nets have one thing most different groups don’t. They have Durant and Irving, two shoo-in Hall of Famers who double as two of the perfect scorers in NBA historical past. And they’ve expertise with their backs towards the wall, as a result of in a manner, they’ve been taking part in pressing, determined basketball for the previous two months.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com