A COVID-19 outbreak that KO’d James Harden and six other players left the Nets with the NBA’s minimum of eight available players — four of them rookies — for Tuesday night’s game against the Raptors at Barclays Center.
But the Nets still had Kevin Durant and he was brilliant as ever in an improbable 131-129 overtime victory.
Durant, playing on a sore ankle that made him a game-time decision to even play, had a triple-double (34 points, 13 rebounds, 11 assists) in a game-high 48:11.
Patty Mills (season-high 30 points) sent the game to overtime with a three-pointer with 13.1 seconds left. The key free throws to ice the game in overtime were hit by Mills and David Duke Jr.
Six Nets, including Harden, were placed in the NBA’s COVID protocols on Tuesday, bringing the team’s total to seven.
Paul Millsap was placed on the list on Monday. On Tuesday, he was joined by LaMarcus Aldridge, James Johnson, DeAndre’ Bembry and Jevon Carter – all of whom were placed on the list early in the day – plus Harden and Bruce Brown. The last two were added less than an hour before the scheduled tipoff.
Also early Tuesday, the Nets announced that Durant was questionable for the game because of right ankle soreness. It wasn’t until nearly 7 p.m. that the team announced that Durant, who scored 51 points on Sunday, was going to play.
The Nets (20-8), who trailed by nine going into the fourth quarter, used an 18-4 run to take a 117-111 lead with 4:42 left. The Raptors followed with a 9-0 run and took a 120-117 lead on a Gary Trent Jr. three-pointer with 1:21 to go.
Fred VanVleet led Toronto (13-15) with 31 points.
The Nets started Durant, Mills, Duke, Blake Griffin and Nic Claxton.
It was the first start for Duke in his third career game. The bench was Cam Thomas, Kessler Edwards and Day’Ron Sharpe. Edwards and Sharpe were called up from the G League Long Island Nets on Monday.
The Nets tied a season high in any half by scoring 66 in the first half to go into the locker room with a 10-point lead. Only 15 of those points were by Durant.
The Nets, despite at one point going with a lineup that included Mills and four rookies, led by as many as 13 in the half.
But the Raptors outscored the Nets 44-25 in the third quarter to go into the fourth with a 100-91 advantage.
The Nets have five games – all at home – scheduled between Tuesday and Dec. 21 before they begin a Western swing in Portland on Dec. 23.
All the Nets players in the COVID protocol are vaccinated. If they weren’t, they wouldn’t be allowed to play in Brooklyn under New York City rules (like with Kyrie Irving).
According to NBA rules, vaccinated players are placed in COVID protocols when they test positive or have an inconclusive result. The players must quarantine for 10 days or until they have two negative tests within 24 hours.
"First, we concern ourselves with their health and safety," coach Steve Nash said. "Fortunately for us, they're predominantly asymptomatic. But there will be a period of time required for them to test negative and have our full group together."
Nash said there "were a couple of coaches and a couple of staff affected as well" by the outbreak.
The NBA on Monday postponed two Chicago Bulls games, the first postponements this season because of COVID, due to an outbreak among players and staff. The Nets hosted the Bulls on Dec. 4.
"It's a new normal, but it's scary because I don't know that there's an end in sight," Nash said. "This is kind of the world we may live in for indefinitely. We've all been affected by this. I've lost family members. The day-to-day life, even if you haven't lost people, is changed and may not go back to what it was for like I said, indefinitely."
