Here are my three thoughts on the Nets’ 102-100 win over the Raptors on Tuesday night:
1. Jason Kidd caught a lot of flak — including from this writer — for his decision to go away from the group that carried the Nets to a 15-point lead down the stretch in the fourth quarter in Toronto. But that shouldn’t overshadow Kidd making a pair of shrewd coaching decisions that played a large role in his team coming away with a desperately needed win.
The first was shortening his rotation to nine players, benching Reggie Evans and going with a bench of Tyshawn Taylor, Alan Anderson, Mirza Teletovic and Mason Plumlee behind his starting five. The other was changing up his deployment of players, including bringing Garnett back in before the end of the first quarter (as opposed to the start of the second) and playing Andray Blatche deeper into the first.
The Nets, for one of the first times this season, seemed to develop a cohesive rotation as the game progressed. Instead of looking disjointed, as they often have when using line-change-type substitutions in the opening weeks of the season, they looked like a team full of players who knew they would get extended playing-time opportunities and when.
Those two things went a long way towards preserving a win the Nets really had to have.
2. Since the Nets lost Brook Lopez to a sprained left ankle on Nov. 15, they’ve been unable to score or defend inside. Well, that definitely wasn’t the case against the Raptors — the Nets dominated in the paint, outscoring Toronto 48-28.
The big reason the Nets were able to score inside was because of an excellent performance from Andray Blatche, who went 10-for-16 from the field, scored a team-high 24 points and provided the kind of low-post presence that has been completely absent with Lopez sidelined. It was a team defensive effort – the kind that has not been seen since Lopez went out of the lineup – that helped limit the Raptors to 28 points in the paint on 14-for-34 shooting close to the basket.
The Nets were unable to slow down Toronto’s backcourt of Kyle Lowry (24 points) and DeMar DeRozan (27 points), continuing a different trend that has given the Nets trouble. If they can keep teams out of the paint, though, they’ll live with guards going 6-for-11 from 3-point range like Lowry and DeRozan did.
3. Tuesday was a good step forward, but if the Nets want the win to mean anything, they have to back it up with another win Wednesday night back in Brooklyn over the Lakers.
The Nets have yet to win back-to-back games and have only won two games in the last two weeks. Though it’s just 14 games into the season, the Nets have already dug themselves into a massive hole. And with a back-to-back set against Houston and Memphis on the road Friday and Saturday – a brutal pair of games – with a banged-up lineup, the Nets have to get a win against a mediocre Lakers team that is missing Kobe Bryant and coming off a loss on the road Tuesday night to the depleted Wizards.