P.J. Carlesimo’s job status is destined to be a storyline as long as the Nets are playing.
With Carlesimo still carrying an interim label despite leading the Nets to a 35-19 record — good for the sixth-best winning percentage in the NBA since his promotion — since taking over for Avery Johnson in late December, it’s only natural to wonder what Carlesimo needs to accomplish to convince Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov to keep him as the head coach next season.
But Carlesimo says he isn’t worried about it, and instead is focused on the task currently in front of him — getting his players prepared to head into the United Center in Chicago tomorrow night for Game 3 of the Nets’ first-round series with the Bulls, tied at one game apiece.
“No, it’s easy,” Carlesimo said on a conference call yesterday of being able to block out the talk about his future. “I don’t read about it, hopefully don’t have to talk about it and, even when you do, it’s doesn’t affect what we do.
“I hope I’m working as hard as I can work. I know our staff is. So, it’s just a way of looking at it, and I’ve been doing it for a long time and it’s usually the same people saying one thing one day and saying something different the next day. You can’t control that.”
* Other than having some players come in for treatment, Carlesimo gave his team the day off after playing two games in three days. Though the Nets are not nearly as banged up as the Bulls are, he said the extra day off between Game 2 and Game 3 came at an opportune time.
“You’d rather have it coming off of a win, but both [teams] are happy to be resting today,” he said. “I don’t know how hard we’re going to be able to go [in practice today], but we have two days and hopefully the guys that are banged up, hopefully we can get them back to, if not 100 percent, but feeling a lot better by [tomorrow] night.”
* Andray Blatche and Brook Lopez each picked up single votes for the NBA’s Most Improved Player award.
Blatche, who revitalized his career by averaging 10.3 points and 5.1 rebounds while shooting 51 percent from the field and being the only Net to appear in all 82 games, received one first-place vote and was tied for 15th in the voting. Lopez, who bounced back from missing nearly all of last season with a pair of right foot injuries to lead NBA centers in scoring at 19.4 points and earn his first All-Star appearance, received one third-place vote.
Indiana’s Paul George won the award.