ORLANDO, Fla. —This time, the Nets got a lead and held onto it.
After the Magic cut the advantage to seven points early in the third quarter, the Nets responded with a 25-8 run to end the third and didn’t take their foot off the gas from there, cruising to a resounding 107-68 victory last night in front of 17,532.
“We needed it,” said Deron Williams, who finished with 12 points and four assists. “It was a good way to respond to the last two and win this one handily. We did a lot of great things on defense, and while they’re missing a lot of guys, it was still a good win for us for the morale of the team.”
It briefly looked like the Nets (2-2) might fall into the same trap they did in Monday’s 107-96 loss to the Timberwolves, when they surrendered a 22-point lead in the second half. After taking a 50-36 lead into the halftime break, Orlando started the second half on a 7-0 run to cut the lead to single digits.
But then the Nets turned on the jets, scoring 20 of the next 22 points and turning the game into a much-needed laugher down the stretch after blowing Monday’s game and then getting blown out by the defending champion Heat on Wednesday.
“I didn’t want to have these thoughts about ‘here we go again,’ ” Nets coach Avery Johnson said. “I was waiting to see if I was going to have to call a timeout there to get us going, but Deron did a good job of leading the guys, keeping them together.
“One of the things [Nets general manager Billy King] and I were talking about is since we’ve had a 20-point lead and didn’t have great results, now that we’ve had a lead, let’s see if we’ve matured a little bit and learned something from it. And fortunately we did.”
The Nets made it clear before the game they were going to emphasize getting the ball inside to Brook Lopez after he had just three shots in the first half of the blowout loss to Miami.
They followed through on their promise, getting the ball to Lopez on virtually every possession early in the game. And, Lopez delivered.
After hearing his name bandied about in the Dwight Howard trade talks throughout the last year, Lopez looked like someone with a point to prove at Howard’s former stomping grounds. He finished the first quarter with 11 points, six rebounds and a block, and wound up with 14 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks.
“I just focused on running in transition and getting deep seals,” Lopez said. “I was giving the guards a big target where they could throw the ball. And defensively I wanted to be that last line of defense, so when they get to the basket I’m the wall and my guards can trust me that if they get beat I’ll be there.”
The Nets also received a huge boost from an unexpected source in veteran shooting guard Jerry Stackhouse, who pumped in 11 first-half points, including three 3-pointers, much to the delight of his teammates.
“That was a lot of fun out there,” Stackhouse said with a smile. “We needed to bounce back.”
* There’s something about the Nets and sprained ankles. Now three players — Gerald Wallace, Josh Childress and MarShon Brooks — have suffered the same injury in the past two weeks.
Wallace, who sprained his left ankle at the end of Saturday’s season-opening win, missed his third straight game, while Brooks also sat out after he sprained his ankle going through pick-and-roll defense drills during morning shootaround. Brooks said he could miss a game or two, but expected to be back soon.
Childress made his season debut after he re-aggravated his ankle sprain in the preseason finale Oct. 24 against the Knicks. Childress finished with two points, two rebounds and two assists in 25 minutes.