NEW ORLEANS — Deron Williams declared he’s done talking about injuries.
If he keeps playing like he did last night against the Hornets, his game will do more than enough talking for him.
Williams turned in his best performance since the All-Star break, finishing with 33 points— including the Nets’ final 11 — to go along with eight assists to lead the Nets to a 101-97 victory over the Hornets in front of 12,651 inside New Orleans Arena.
“It feels good to get going, and especially down the stretch to close out a game,” said Williams after going 10-for-21 from the field and 4-for-8 from 3-point range. “It’s something I’ve kind of struggled with this year, and I was really successful at most of my career, so it feels really good to finally have a game like that.
“I just wanted to step up for our team, and I especially wanted to step up after the last game went down the stretch for me personally.”
After Williams tried unsuccessfully to draw a foul and then committed a turnover in the final minute of Sunday’s loss to Memphis, the Nets (34-24) needed every point they got from Williams to hold off the hard-charging Hornets (20-38), who fought back from what once was a 22-point deficit in the first half to get the game to as close as a two-point game inside the final seconds.
But Williams, playing without backcourt partner Joe Johnson for the third straight game as he continues to sit out with a sore left heel, made sure the absence of the Nets’ closer didn’t result in another close loss like the ones the Nets suffered Friday against Houston and Sunday against the Grizzlies in Brooklyn.
Williams drained a 3-pointer that gave the Nets a 93-84 lead with 1:24 remaining, and followed it up with a tough fadeaway jumper that again put them up nine with a minute remaining.
Then, as the Hornets kept hitting 3-pointers to pull themselves back into a game that had seemed over multiple times, Williams calmly stepped to the foul line and drained six straight free throws inside the final 20 seconds to put it out of reach.
“He did all the things we needed him to do,” Nets interim coach P.J. Carlesimo said. “A lot of guys made plays, but Deron played extremely well and really made big plays for us down the stretch.”
Last night’s performance was just Williams’ latest impressive showing since missing the final two games before the All-Star break to undergo platelet rich plasma treatment on both his ailing ankles, which he later followed up with a scheduled round of cortisone shots — his third round of them this season — last Thursday.
Williams, who wore a protective sleeve on his left calf after getting hit with a knee late in Sunday’s loss to Memphis and also included him getting his right (shooting) hand stepped on early in the second half, is averaging 22.8 points and 8.4 assists while shooting 44.6 percent from the field and 51.5 percent from 3-point range in the five games since the break — all far above his season averages.
“He’s moving faster,” said Keith Bogans, who finished with 12 points on a perfect 4-for-4 from the field. “He’s been working, icing a lot, doing a lot of treatment. … That’s the key, just to get healthy and let your body heal up.
“That’s all you can do. We play so many games, it’s hard to let your body heal, so he has to find the time.”