In their first playoff appearance since 2015, the Brooklyn Nets are on the brink of elimination after dropping both home games this past weekend, but it wasn’t without a fight––literally.
The Nets dropped a golden opportunity in their first home playoff game in 5 seasons, after a 131-115 game 3 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, who were without their All Star center Joel Embiid.
With the Nets stealing game 1, the chippiness of game 2 and the series tied 1-1, Thursday nights game––in front of the Brooklyn faithful––had the makings of another shocker or at least a hard-fought matchup. Neither was the case and for 48 minutes it was a display of half-hearted and unmotivated defense from the Nets as the 76ers completely dominated them in every facet of the game.
But all of that changed on Saturday during game 4 when all of the tension finally boiled over and Nets forward Jared Dudley pushed Embiid. The frenzy ensued and several players, including Ben Simmons, Jimmy Butler and Dudley spilled into the stands.
The scuffle began after a second flagrant foul of the series by Embiid on Nets Jarrett Allen. Dudley ran towards Embiid shoved the 76ers All Star, when Jimmy Butler retaliated with a push of his own. Both Dudley and Butler were ejected.
But while some think getting Butler ejected was a win during Saturday’s game, the Nets lost game 4, 112-108 and still face elimination on Tuesday’s in Philadelphia, so as much as Dudley showed the toughness of Brooklyn, it still hurt them on the court.
What the Nets should worry about going forward is preventing the Sixers from controlling game 5 defensively by taking away Brooklyn’s offensive flow and three-point shot. Not so much their attempts, but the high percentage shots they look for when shooting from behind the arc. The way they’ve done over the last three games.
“I think they did an outstanding job defensively. Taking away Joe (Harris) is huge. It’s like taking JJ (Redick) away. Joe gives us a lot of our movement.”, said coach Kenny Atkinson whose game 1 victory came from removing the 76ers only legitimate shooting threat. “ Like I said, a lot of it is them, but I do think we can move it better. We obviously have to shoot it better. We didn’t shoot it well, and we also struggled at the rim. Not a good offensive performance on our part.”
Brooklyn has also struggled mightily on the defensive end with an inability to make stops. Their starting lineup has been dominant offensively since game 1 and despite playing hurt, Embiid has averaged 25 points and 14 rebounds throughout the series. Simmons has also been a thorn for the Nets and while the Nets have spurts of defensive irritation, the second year point guard is averaging 18 points 7.3 rebounds and 8 assists.
While the stars are doing their job what’s really been hurting the Nets is the play of Tobias Harris, Jimmy Butler and more importantly JJ Redick who gets the 76ers offense going with his movement.
“I thought JJ’s run really got us off kilter defensively. When someone gets hot like that, the defense starts cheating and helping, and then other guys get off too. I thought that was a big part of the game,” Atkinson admitted. “We didn’t do a good enough job on him. He is elite at getting open, and they did a fantastic job screening for him. He is flying around, and we are chasing him. They are setting great screens, and we didn’t do a good enough job staying attached. We just didn’t execute it at a high enough level,”
With the Nets facing elimination on Tuesday’s they have to execute on both ends of the floor better than they have throughout this series. Either way there are no longer any excuses and they don’t intend on making any.
“We’d like to make that excuse, obviously this is a learning experience. For a lot of us, this is our first time playing big minutes in the playoffs,” Spencer Dinwiddie said. “But we were right there. We feel like we should’ve won. “We weren’t saying this was a learning experience when we won Game 1. So we can’t fall back on that now. We need to try to pull off something incredible.”
