With the Bulls missing three starters and the Nets jumping out to a 24-14 lead after the first quarter, it looked as if the home team would be in for an easy night in Brooklyn.
Instead, the Nets found themselves in the middle of a dogfight with a relentless opponent that refused to give an inch, even playing without guard Kirk Hinrich, forward Carlos Boozer and All-Star center Joakim Noah.
“We had the 10-point lead, and thought, ‘Oh, it’s going to be easy [with] no Boozer and Joakim,’ and we were overpowering them,” interim coach P.J. Carlesimo said. “But then they went small and our second group didn’t start well in the second quarter, and suddenly [a 10-point lead] went to four and then it’s like, ‘Here we go again.’ ”
But thanks to contributions from all over the roster, including an inspired effort from the bench in the fourth quarter, the Nets were able to emerge with a hard-fought and desperately needed 93-89 victory over the Bulls Friday night in front of a sellout crowd of 17,732 at Barclays Center.
The Nets (28-19) spent most of the night playing against the Bulls’ reserves, thanks to their starters being sidelined, and saw their own bench carry them. Andray Blatche, MarShon Brooks and C.J. Watson combined to score 25 of the Nets’ 30 fourth-quarter points, including a key three-point play by Blatche with just over a minute left and a pair of free throws by Watson to ice the game with 11 seconds.
After Deron Williams had said before the game the Nets have struggled at times to keep their heads up when things start to go badly for them, he was encouraged by the team’s ability to rally on a night when they didn’t always play at their best.
“I think it was good for us,” said Williams, who finished with 11 points and six assists while playing through his latest injury, tweaking his right ankle late in the first half. “It was good for all the people that played well. C.J. and Andray got going, MarShon … it was good to see those guys get some confidence, because we’re going to need those guys as we move forward, and especially in the playoffs.”
It had looked early on as if the Nets would have little trouble with Chicago, as the home team dominated the lane. Brook Lopez and Reggie Evans combined for 13 first-quarter points, as the Nets scored 18 points in the paint and jumped out to that 24-14 lead after one.
But Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau, who beat out Carlesimo for Eastern Conference Coach of the Month honors, decided to go small for the remainder of the game, a move that gave the Nets fits.
After the Bulls outscored the Nets 28-17 in the second quarter to take a one-point lead at halftime, the Bulls then pushed the lead to 53-47 on a layup by Jimmy Butler with 7:19 remaining in the third.
But then Carlesimo made an adjustment of his own, pulling Evans and using Gerald Wallace at power forward the rest of the way, which allowed the Nets to match the Bulls all over the court.
“Your mindset changes with the position you play,” Wallace said. “When you go down to the four, you’re more focused on rebounding and trying to limit the other guys to one stop. You’re considered a big, so your main thing is just trying to get rebounds and stops. That was our main thing tonight, trying to crash the boards, limit them to one shot and get us extra possessions.”
Switching Wallace to power forward also opened up more room in the paint, which allowed the Nets to then successfully pound the ball into either Lopez, who led the team with 20 points, and Blatche, who scored all 11 of his points in the fourth quarter.
And in the end, the Nets made sure they didn’t let a game they had to win — given the amount of firepower the Bulls were missing and the fact the Nets play eight of their 12 games this month against teams with winning records — slip away from them.
“I thought [our players] did a good job of regrouping at halftime,” Carlesimo said. “I thought they did a very good job. We fell behind [in the third], but by that point I think they had decided this is the kind of game it’s going to be, and let’s find a way to win.”
tbontemps@nypost.com