For the Brooklyn Nets it was a weekend with a win and two major losses. After an important victory against the Chicago Bulls that furthers the gap in the standings, the Nets fell to the lowly Wizards, but what was an even bigger loss was yet another Kyrie Irving injury that could sideline the star for some time.
On Friday night at the Barclays Center Irving scored a season-high 54 points, to lead the Brooklyn Nets(21-27) to a 133-118 victory over the Chicago Bulls(19-33).
It was a stellar performance by the misunderstood point guard whose previous season-high—a 50 point game—was against the Minnesota Timberwolves in the season-opener
Maybe more impressive than the 54 is the fact that Irving shot 82 percent on 19 for 23 in the field.
“I hit a few shots, so I had to keep going and Kobe mentality, and Mamba mentality, keep going,” Irving said after also pouring seven 3-pointers against the Bulls. “It’s still hard, everyone’s still grieving, but I think coming out here, knowing this is a place where we connected on a deep scale, it makes a lot of sense [being out there].”
Irving wasn’t the only one putting work either. Fan favorite Spencer Dinwiddie added 15 with 7 assists while Taurean Prince dropped 11 of his 16 points in the first half.
It wasn’t all good though. The Nets found themselves on the other end of the wins-loss column against the Washington Wizards(17-31) on the second night of a back to back.
Not only did the nets blow a fourth-quarter lead in their 113-107 loss at Washington, but they found themselves out a point guard after Irving suffering a medial ligament sprain in his right knee.
The injury happened while getting tied up with Wizards star Bradley Beal (game-high 34 points) holding on to a rebound. It came with 5:31 left, in the game during a decisive 23-8 game-ending run by the Wizards that turned a must-have win for the Nets into a crushing loss.
“I’ve done some pretty decent things to my knee in the past. I just wanted to make sure my ACL, my MCL, my PCL, our medical staff did their check. The most important thing is just my ACL, make sure it was fine. It was just a weird, weird, weird fall. I just felt a lot of stretching and tension afterward. Just a bad fall,” said Irving after the game.
For Irving, injuries have become just as much a part of his career as the explosive scoring has. The all-star guard already missed 26 straight games this season with a shoulder impingement.
With the Nets hanging on to the eighth seed by a thread every win counts and every loss puts them further into the depths of mediocrity where they have sat for the better part of their history in the NBA.
With Irving signing during the offseason the expectations were tempered as Kevin Durant expected to miss the entire 2019-20 season, but for the Nets to look like the same as they did last season makes you wonder if this team can ever really be a contender.
Irving, for now, is expected to miss just one week of game action, but more than likely he’ll be back in full action after the All-Star break.
