Good teams find a way to win. Bad teams let wins slip between their fingers.
The Nets are trying to buck an early bad-team trend — their inability to close winnable games in the fourth quarter. That’s what it took for Brooklyn to come away with its second win in a row, a come-from-behind 98-84 victory over the Charlotte Hornets that featured a momentum-swinging late-game run.
Kevin Durant powered a 12-0 Nets run midway through the fourth quarter after the Hornets ran up a double-digit lead. It is the team’s second straight victory in the absence of Kyrie Irving, who is away from the team serving a minimum five-game suspension for posting an antisemitic film on his social media channels. It was also another game the Nets played without Ben Simmons, the embattled star forward battling a combination of back issues and a swollen left knee.
On a 74-degree day in Brooklyn, the Nets were ice-cold on the road.
Coming off a record-setting blowout win over the Washington Wizards on Friday, the Nets simply couldn’t buy a basket. The Nets were so cold, they must have frozen the stats system in Charlotte because box score numbers shut down after the first half.
Chief among those struggling from the field were sharpshooters Joe Harris and Seth Curry, both of whom are recovering from recent ankle surgeries.
It took a group effort for the Nets to defeat the Hornets, who were missing a number of players, including franchise cornerstone LaMelo Ball and former All-Star wing Gordon Hayward.
Durant powered the fourth-quarter run, but some tweaks from interim coach Jacque Vaughn helped seal the deal.
For the second game in a row, Vaughn has implemented reserve forward Yuta Watanabe as a small-ball five off the bench behind Nic Claxton. Claxton had an impressive game but was plagued by foul trouble, and Vaughn turned to Watanabe — a capable 3-point shooter, slasher, and positional defender — to close the game.
Vaughn’s closing lineup also featured Durant, Royce O’Neale, Joe Harris and second-year guard Cam Thomas, who continues to step up in the opportunity given to him in Irving’s absence. Thomas came up with a critical steal on an intercepted pass late in the fourth quarter that swung the momentum back Brooklyn’s way.
The Nets now have a day off before heading to Dallas to face Luka Doncic’s Mavericks in the final game of their road trip. The last time the Nets faced the Mavericks, they lost at Barclays Center in overtime, 129-125, on a 40-point triple-double from Doncic, a frontrunner for league Most Valuable Player of the Year.
The Nets, however, have all the momentum now winning two in a row for the first time this season. They’ll have a chance to make it three before returning home to defend home court against the New York Knicks next week.
