MILWAUKEE — After the Nets spent much of this week talking about strategies and adjustments, coach Jason Kidd and his players kept it simple Saturday night against the Bucks: give the ball to Brook Lopez and get out of the way.
The strategy worked like a charm, as Lopez scored a season-high 32 points and the Nets came away with a desperately needed 90-82 victory over the Bucks in front of an announced crowd of 14,963 that was far smaller than that inside BMO Harris Bradley Center.
“That’s Brook,” Kidd said. “That’s who he is. He’s a guy who demands attention, and he’s seen a lot of double teams in his young career, and he’s making all of the right plays.
“He’s letting guys get to their spots, and guys are knocking down shots, so at some point he’ll see a little bit more of the single coverage where he feels comfortable, but then he’s going to get double-teams and guys are going to get open and knock down shots.”
Coming off a 30-point blowout loss to the crosstown rival Knicks on their home floor Thursday, the Nets (6-14) repeatedly dumped the ball into the post where Lopez had his way with a series of much smaller Bucks defenders, something Bucks coach Larry Drew said he was concerned about pregame.
“Brook Lopez is such a load,” Drew said before the game, “and certainly we’re going to need every big man available to try to defend him. It’s going to be a really interesting night, to say the least, particularly because we’re two big men short.
“We know the problem Lopez poses down in the post, so we’re really going to have to be good tonight.”
The Bucks (4-16) simply weren’t good enough to handle Lopez, however, as missing both starting center Larry Sanders and backup Zaza Pachulia due to injury left them with no way of slowing Lopez down in the post. He finished the game with those 32 points on 11-for-13 shooting to go along with seven rebounds, four assists and two blocked shots in 40 minutes, which Kidd joked he didn’t realize after the game.
“He draws so much attention that we can play through him all game,” said Joe Johnson. If they don’t double team, he’s gonna score or get fouled, and if they do double, then we have guys like me and Alan Andereson on the perimeter who are going to make them pay.”
Lopez didn’t get much help, however, as the rest of the Nets combined to shoot 23-for-61 (37.7 percent) from the field, with Johnson scoring 15 points to go with five assists, while Alan Anderson added 13 and Andray Blatche had 11 to go along with eight rebounds.
It didn’t matter much, though, given that the Bucks weren’t able to get anything going offensively, either. A lot of that had to do with the fact that the Nets were able to limit their turnovers, committing just eight that led to six Bucks points, which kept the much younger and faster Bucks — who were led by 22 points from O.J. Mayo — from being able to get out in the open floor and exploit the Nets’ porous transition defense. The Nets, meanwhile, scored 21 points off 12 Bucks turnovers.
“We helped each other out, we listened and we just played hard for the whole 48 minutes,” Anderson said. “We didn’t get down on ourselves for missing shots, missing assignments. … We just kept communicating with each other.”
The Nets even played well in the third quarter — something that rarely has happened as this season given they entered Saturday night’s game as easily the worst third quarter team in the league. But led by eight points from Lopez, the Nets won the third 26-19, taking a six-point lead into the fourth that they held onto for the win, thanks in large part to riding their size advantages around the court, led by Lopez, to a 44-30 advantage in points in the paint.
“It was a good team effort,” Lopez said. “It was a great team effort, and that’s exactly what we needed. We need to take this momentum and let it carry us.”
With the win, the Nets moved back to within 2 ¹/₂ games of the first-place Celtics in the woeful Atlantic Division, and depending on how Boston fares against the Knicks Sunday at the Garden, the Nets could have a chance to pull to within a game of the Celtics when the two teams face off in Brooklyn Tuesday.
But rather than worrying about where they are in the standings, after losing 12 of their past 15 entering Saturday night’s game, the Nets were simply happy to get a win for a change.
“A win is a win at this point, and any win is a good win,” Johnson said. “We’re just trying to build on it, honestly. We’ll get back to the drawing board tomorrow or Monday, and start preparing for the next game.”