MIAMI — Ever since the Nets began their 2014 renaissance, they have met virtually every challenge in front of them.
They have gone 22-9, giving them the fourth best record in the NBA and the best in the Eastern Conference over that span. They have the fifth best defense in the league over that same time, allowing 101.1 points per 100 possessions according to NBA.com, and have recorded more steals and forced more turnovers than any other team, despite playing at a slower pace than a vast majority of the teams in the league. They also have picked up several impressive wins, beating the Warriors, Heat, Thunder, Bulls and Grizzlies.
But the Nets will have their hands full Wednesday night when they face the two-time defending champion Heat on the shores of Biscayne Bay. Miami is beginning to round into form and will be seeking at least some level of payback since the Nets already knocked them off twice in Brooklyn this season.
“It’s big,” said Shaun Livingston after the Nets beat the Raptors, 101-97, on Monday to keep their realistic hopes of winning the Atlantic Division alive. “We know they’re going to come out and try to slap us from the start. They obviously are trying to get back on track, trying to get their playoff swagger together, and the last two games we played against them we had some success.
“That will be in the back of their minds, and we have to come in and match their intensity.”
The Heat, who lost three straight on the road to the Rockets, Spurs and Bulls last week before beating the Wizards at home Monday, had won eight straight before that stumble last week, and are beginning to get Dwyane Wade — who played in both halves of a back-to-back for just the third time this year, Sunday against the Bulls and Monday versus the Wizards — healthy and on track.
There’s also the fact the Nets will have to take down the Heat without Kevin Garnett and possibly Andrei Kirilenko, both of whom sat out Monday’s win with injuries. Garnett, who didn’t make the trip to Miami, will miss a seventh straight game with back spasms. He was initially set to return against Toronto before being scratched moments before the game began.
Kirilenko sat out Monday with a sprained right ankle suffered in Sunday’s win over the Kings. He did, however, make the trip, and his status is questionable for the Heat.
The Nets have won more than 70 percent of their games since Jan. 1, and the enters Wednesday’s showdown with wins in six of their last seven games.
“It’s big, man,” said Alan Anderson, who snapped out of a recent scoring funk with 11 points against Toronto. “Huge. [The Heat are] waiting for us, and we’re definitely waiting on them. It’s big for us.”
Because of the enormous hole the Nets dug for themselves to begin the season, it has taken two months of sustained excellent play for them to finally pull themselves over the .500 mark.
Because of the jumbled up nature of the middle of the pack in the Eastern Conference — where the sixth-place Nets are just three games back of the Raptors in third, and only a half-game behind the Wizards in fifth — the Nets know every game over the next month will matter in terms of where they finish and who they’ll face in the first round of the playoffs and potentially beyond.
“You have 20 games left, and every one means something as far as moving up in the standings, how you’re going to position yourself, whether you’re going to have homecourt or you’re going on the road in the first round,” Paul Pierce said. “All these games are huge.
“Everybody is pumped up and together. … Outside of Miami and Indiana, you see Washington, Chicago, Toronto, you see us, we’re right there. All those four teams can change week-by-week right now, and we’re just trying to get ourselves in the best position possible going into the playoffs.”