Here are my three thoughts on the Nets’ 101-90 win over the Magic Tuesday night in Brooklyn:
1. Over the past three games, the Nets have gotten the best of Andray Blatche.
It’s been an up-and-down season for the colorful big man, who after missing four games for personal reasons, came back against the Cavaliers on Jan. 4 and struggled in his first few games back with the team. But Blatche played his best game of the season against the Hawks in London on Thursday, putting up 20 points, 14 rebounds and six assists, and then followed that up with 19 points and 12 rebounds against the Knicks on Monday and 18 points and five rebounds against Orlando in Tuesday’s win.
Talent has never been the question for Blatche, who has a versatile offensive skill set. When he’s going, like he has been recently, he can both score in the post and all the way out to the 3-point line, as he demonstrated on back-to-back possessions in the fourth quarter Tuesday by throwing down a mammoth slam dunk over Queens native Kyle O’Quinn before hitting a corner 3-pointer on the following possession.
If the Nets can keep Blatche playing like this — coupled with a resurgent Kevin Garnett — they can come close to replicating the 1-2 punch Blatche formed with Brook Lopez last season to give the Nets one of the best center combinations in the NBA.
2. It’s been impressive to see the way Shaun Livingston can impact a game even when he’s struggling with his shot.
Livingston finished with eight points on 3-for-9 shooting Tuesday, and looked to be forcing his shot a little too much at times. But when you consider he also had six assists, four rebounds and a steal — as well as using his length to give Jameer Nelson all kinds of problems defensively — you see the impact he had on the game went beyond his basic offensive stat line.
Since becoming a full-time member of the starting lineup, Livingston has often been used as the primary defensive stopper on the perimeter, taking the best guard on the opposing team. He’s done an excellent job on Kyle Korver in a pair of Nets wins over Atlanta, and was crucial in giving Kevin Durant problems in the win that began this January turnaround, in Oklahoma City on Jan. 2.
After a brief downturn earlier in the season when he wore down under a sudden, heavy increase in minutes, Livingston has gotten his second wind and been able to withstand the additional minutes — and thrive with them.
3. Winning both halves of a back-to-back for the first time this season was a big step for the Nets. But it was equally important for them to take care of business against a pair of opponents that, if the Nets have truly turned the corner, they needed to beat handily.
They did that, blowing out both the Knicks and Magic, doing exactly what they should against bad teams. Now comes another stretch of three games in four nights — home for Dallas on Friday, at Boston on Sunday and home for Toronto on Monday — that could allow them to continue their recent hot streak. If the Nets could win two, or even all three, it would put them in great position to snatch the lead in the Atlantic Division from the Raptors, as well as putting them in position to snag the third seed in the East.
That’s exactly where many predicted they would finish when the season began. But while they may finish about where they were expected to, it certainly will have been a much more interesting road to get there than anyone would have guessed.