The Brooklyn Nets played their first game in over a week against the Toronto Raptors on Thursday. The All-Star break preceded a stretch of “28 games in 55 days,” which has become a mantra for the East’s 11-seed before the stretch run. The Nets took the opportunity to rest to the extreme, not sending a single representative to Indiana for All-Star festivities. Not in the game, nor any individual contests, nothing.
And they still had the busiest break of any team. Mikal Bridges and his interesting, I suppose, podcast spot hardly made a dent, considering the Nets then fired Head Coach Jacque Vaughn. Sean Marks spoke about his job security, the team introduced Kevin Ollie as the interim leader, and then, right at the buzzer, it was reported that members of the Koch family are in talks to buy up to 15% of the Brooklyn Nets and their parent company, BSE Global.
However you felt about that barrage of news, the Nets finally returning to the court certainly made you feel worse. If you were optimistic that a coaching change and a blank injury report for the first time all season would at least make Brooklyn either more watchable, less bad or some combination of the two, it went away quickly.
Maybe it was after the first 24 minutes, where the Nets trailed by a modest 59-48. Other than Bridges, who backed up a spirited post-break interview by scoring 15 of his team-high 21 points in the first half, Brooklyn had no way to put the ball in the basket.
Turnover after turnover led to fast-breaks for Toronto, which Brooklyn didn’t exactly provide a ton of resistance to. Some turnovers were the result of a re-energized Raptors defense that came sprinting out of their All-Star break, some were inexplicable. The Nets had butterfingers all night, routine passes went wayward, players fell and/or dribbled it off their foot; say what you will about Kevin Ollie going ten deep in the first quarter, or exclusively playing Ben Simmons next to another big men, but some of Thursday’s mistakes were out of his control.
“Regardless who’s coaching, who’s out there, you just gotta have some pride,” said Ben Simmons.
And yet, when Brooklyn was able to set up their half-court defense, all was well. They opened the third quarter on a 12-2 run to cut the deficit to a single point. (The Raptors, after all, entered at 18-36 for a reason.) Brooklyn never looked like the better team at any point, but Toronto’s lead was never out of control. For the first 30 minutes or so, the Nets would slump, trail by double-digits, then get their act together to cut into the lead without getting back to even ground.
Cam Thomas had taken over the scoring mantle after Bridges’ hot start, and would finish with 19 points, leading a couple of those mini-comebacks himself:
But eventually, the wheels fell off, and the scoreboard finally reflected the misery of the night.
Brooklyn never fixed their problems, no matter who was on the floor. You can point to Cam Johnsons’ horrid 0-of-6 shooting from deep, or the invisibility of Ben Simmons and Dennis Schröder, who combined to shoot 2-of-9 and put up a +/- of -53.
Schroder would've been a solid add for a contender in need of a backup PG. Never understood why the Nets, a non-contender, would take on his $ for next season when they could've just waived Dinwiddie's expiring themselves. Not making any more sense to me watching this team play.
— Josh Lewenberg (@JLew1050) February 23, 2024
And on the other side, Toronto’s leading trio of Scottie Barnes, Gary Trent Jr., and Immanuel Quickley made tough shots all night long. The Raptors shot 45.2% from deep compared to Brooklyn’s 29.7%, including some ‘screw you’ looks...
It all came to a head in the fourth quarter, which Toronto dominated to a 39-22 tune. Brooklyn’s turnover problem kept getting worse — they’d finish with 19 in the game — as did their shot-making woes. The Raptors took full advantage, starting to dominate the boards and continuing to push the break, eventually finishing with 46 fast-break points, the most the Nets have given up this season. It was the type of effort that gets a coach fir—wait...
Said Ollie post-game: “We just didn’t make shots, but their effort, their energy — loose balls, offensive rebounds — they beat us in probably every area and giving up 46 fast-break points and not being able to stop them and limit them in half-court situations was a killer for us.”
It’s just one game under Ollie’s new regime, one game with a fully healthy rotation. However, it’s also another data point in a trend screaming at us that the Brooklyn Nets are not good, they’re not fun, and they get blown out often, no matter who the coach is...
Nets last 7 losses have been by a combined 148 points (21.1 points per game)
— Evan Barnes (@evan_b) February 23, 2024
How’s David Koch Jr.’s jumper looking?
Final Score: Toronto Raptors 121, Brooklyn Nets 93
Milestone Watch
Somehow, we do indeed have milestones!
- Lonnie Walker IV reached 3,000 career points on Thursday night, as Brooklyn’s leading bench-scorer with 11
- Mikal Bridges continues to knock down threes, propelling his recent scoring improvement. Since January 19, he’s played 15 games; in that span, he has made more threes than every NBA player not named Steph Curry.
One fewer nationally televised game
Even before the Nets lost their game vs. the Raptors, they also lost a game on national TV. The Nets game against the Cavaliers in Cleveland on March 10 has been moved off ESPN, the league announced Thursday. The game was supposed to be the last nationally televised game this season but now there are none, other than two NBA TV games. So, Brooklyn played a total of four games on either ESPN or TNT this season, down from 13 last season.
Next Up
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It doesn’t get easier. Brooklyn will travel south to Minnesota and take on the Western Conference’s one-seed. Nets-Timberwolves tips off at 9:00 p.m. ET on Saturday night.
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February 23, 2024 at 10:18AM
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Brooklyn Nets get destroyed in fourth quarter by Toronto Raptors, lose 121-93 - Nets Daily
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