NEW YORK —A halftime speech from Steve Nash fueled the 28-point, second-half rally that led to the Nets’ unlikely come-from-behind victory against the Knicks on Wednesday. That speech, according to sharpshooter Seth Curry, may have established the Nets’ new identity as they approach the second half of a season marred by injury, but still has championship goals.
“Steve was just saying if we come out and play the right way, we’ll have a chance, but more than that, it’s about establishing our style of basketball, establish who we’re gonna be as a team,” Curry said. “And it wasn’t really about winning or losing. It was about our mindset going out there in that second half and how we’re gonna play.
“Everybody listened, took the message in and went out and played together.”
The Nets trailed 65-44 at halftime and looked lifeless on the court against a physical Knicks team that entered the night three games behind the Eastern Conference’s 10th seed.
And then Nash spoke. It was time to fight back and this time the Nets needed to punch first.
“I challenged them,” the Nets coach said postgame. “The aggressor gets rewarded a lot of the time. I challenged them at halftime that this is a playoff-type physicality and we have to be more physical offensively and we have to be more physical defensively and it’s a test of our character.”
The Knicks built a lead as large as 28 due in large part to hot shooting, but their advantage can also be attributed to the physical style of basketball you see in Tom Thibodeau-coached teams. Nash thought the Nets had mostly played the right way. The Knicks hit nine of their first 13 threes on the night, while the Nets started 1 of 13 from downtown.
Teams rarely stay hot or cold, however, for an entire game. The law of averages played out and the Knicks went ice cold while the Nets began hitting shots down the stretch.
Physicality, however, was non-negotiable.
“He wanted us to get more physical,” said rookie guard Cam Thomas, who added to his resume with another game-winner. “That was the main key, because in the first half they was into us, blowing up all our sets, grabbing us, they were trying to muck the game up a little bit. You know?
“So we just had to get more physical on the glass, screens, everything. So really the physicality part was the challenge.”
The result was a second half in which the Nets outscored the Knicks, 67-41. It was a signature victory for the short-handed team — missing Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Ben Simmons and Joe Harris — that had lost 11 straight games before snapping the skid against the Sacramento Kings on Monday.
And it was a signature victory for Nash, in just his second year as an NBA head coach after leaving his previous role as a player development consultant for the Golden State Warriors.
It’s been a tall order leading a team competing for a championship with no head-coaching experience to lean on. As a result, there have been moments where Nash has looked out-classed: His rotations have been a sticking point, the offense at times has looked stagnant, the defense has regressed back toward average, and the Nets’ 11-game losing streak didn’t make matters better, either.
But Nash found something in challenging his team. The Nets have been resilient all season and have come back from 10 double-digit deficits to win this season. At least part of that resilience has to be attributed to their leader.
“At halftime, we just said, ‘This is a test of our character,’” Nash said. “We want to continue to build the resolve, try to win the third quarter, get more physical at both ends, and play the right way. We’ll get something out of the game. Whether we win or lose, we’ll grow, we’ll get better.
“Like I keep saying during this stretch, we struggle a lot, but we’ve asked the players for things and they’ve brought it. We haven’t been able to win every night, but we’ve been able to grow our resolve, grow our character, our connectivity and tonight that’s really all it came down to.”
