Spencer Dinwiddie regarded on the scoreboard, the time left on the clock, and slapped his fingers in frustration.
Brooklyn’s place to begin guard simply blew it — and he knew it.
Dinwiddie went to the foul line with the Nets down three and had a possibility to make Thursday’s Game 3 in Brooklyn a one-point recreation. The first free throw bounced on the rim 4 instances earlier than falling into the web.
The second clanked off the rim into Sixer possession.
And on the subsequent possession after the Nets obtained a defensive cease, Dinwiddie superior the ball and blew by Sixers guard Tyrese Maxey for a layup that may have tied the sport.
By the time he let it go from his fingers, Sixers’ presumptive MVP Joel Embiid rotated over for the rejection.
And on the following possession, after P.J. Tucker missed a free throw that stored it a one-possession recreation, and after a Jacque Vaughn timeout for a drawn-up play, veteran guard Royce O’Neale had his cross intercepted by De’Anthony Melton, who took the ball the size of the ground to complete with a dunk that gave the Sixers a five-point lead.
Ball recreation. The Nets had their probabilities. They couldn’t take benefit and misplaced, 102-97, into an 3-0 sequence deficit no staff in NBA historical past has ever overcome.
If the Nets wanted a saving grace of their first-round playoff sequence towards the Philadelphia 76ers, it got here within the type of an unlikely whistle on the backside of the third quarter in Game 3 on Thursday.
Ex-Nets star turned 76ers level guard James Harden drove into O’Neale with lower than a minute left within the third interval and made fist-to-groin contact officers deemed an offensive foul.
When O’Neale stayed on the bottom, hunched over in ache, officers went to the sales space to assessment whether or not or not the play certified as a hostile act.
It did: They assessed Harden a flagrant foul penalty two and tossed him from the sport.
Just moments later, beginning heart Nic Claxton was additionally ejected for choosing up his second technical foul. Both got here within the type of taunting Embiid after highlight-reel finishes.
In the primary quarter, Claxton stepped over Embiid after a one-handed alley-oop end despatched the Sixers’ large man tumbling to the bottom. At the highest of the fourth, Claxton dunked on Embiid then stared him down for a number of seconds. Officials instantly tossed the fourth-year large man from the sport.
Thursday’s showdown in entrance of a sold-out crowd at Barclays Center was a must-win for a Nets staff that entered the sequence already dealing with lengthy odds as a No. 6 seed trying to upset a third-seeded Sixers staff with championship expectations. Those odds worsened when the Sixers received each Games 1 and a pair of at Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Center.
Only 7% of groups to lose the primary two video games of an NBA playoff sequence have come again to win the sequence.
The Nets aren’t on tempo to be an outlier.
They did, nevertheless, give yet one more valiant effort, selecting to stay to their defensive recreation plan: cease the run in any respect prices.
Vaughn likes to make use of soccer analogies for his defensive recreation plans, and towards a Sixers staff loaded with offensive weapons, he knew his squad must be taught to dwell with giving up one thing.
What they settled on was particular groups: The Nets figured they might have extra of a possibility to safe a victory forcing different gamers not named Embiid to beat them in a recreation. For the third straight evening, they held Embiid beneath his season common of 33.7 factors per recreation, and for the second straight recreation, they held the famous person large man to twenty factors or much less.
And for the second straight evening, the Nets died on the particular groups hill: Maxey scored 25 factors and shot five-of-eight from downtown. Tobias Harris hit a pair of threes, as did Melton, who added 13 off the bench, none extra necessary than the dunk created from an intercepted cross that put the dagger within the coffin late within the fourth quarter.
Mikal Bridges scored 26 factors on 26 shot makes an attempt, and Dinwiddie completed with 20 factors on 8-of-10 capturing from the foul line.
It wasn’t sufficient, and now the Nets discover themselves within the endgame. Game 4 at Barclays Center on Saturday might be their final recreation of the season. If they win, the sequence will shift again to Philadelphia for Game 5.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com