Here are my three thoughts on the Nets’ 95-93 win over the Thunder Thursday night in Oklahoma City:
1. For as incredible as Joe Johnson’s buzzer-beater over Serge Ibaka’s outstretched arm was Thursday night – and it was a fantastic shot – hearing Johnson walk through his thought process for the game’s final moments was equally fascinating.
So let’s begin with Johnson describing what he was thinking as he went through those final seconds, when he took the ball out with 5.8 seconds left, threw it in to Kevin Garnett and then took the ball back in a handoff at the top of the key.
It also should be noted here the play had a very clever design: By having Johnson receive a handoff from Garnett – who then set a screen on Johnson’s man – it almost guaranteed Johnson would wind up matched against Ibaka, a beneficial matchup for the guard to attack.
“I didn’t even try to look at the [basket] until I came out of my move and went up for my shot,” Johnson said when he was asked if he could even see the basket as Ibaka came leaping out at him. “That’s when I looked. I just, in my head, had the clock going down and like I said, I wanted to make sure we got the last shot.
“I knew Ibaka was long, and I had to put some arc on it.”
Johnson saying he put “some arc” on his shot was an understatement, as he had to put such a high trajectory on it that the ball actually went out of the picture on the YES Network broadcast before coming back down and settling into the net after the buzzer and sending him and his teammates into a wild celebration.
But the thing that stood out about Johnson’s description, even more than the arc on his shot, was him saying he had the clock going down in his head. So he didn’t actually look at the clock while the final seconds were ticking off?
“You kind of have a feel for it,” Johnson said. “You know there’s five seconds [left], so once [Garnett] gave it to me, I knew was going to have 3.5 seconds or three seconds [left], and I just made a move.
“It’s basically instincts. It’s nothing I’m going to tell you I’m going to do before I’m going to do it. I just play off instincts.”
Those instincts sure have worked for the Nets as Johnson has been virtually perfect in those situations since being traded to Brooklyn in July 2012.
2. Since arriving with the Nets, Johnson has unquestionably been the NBA’s most clutch player. Including Thursday’s shot he has hit six buzzer-beaters – twice as many as any other player, with LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Durant leading a list of players who are tied for second with three – since the start of the 2007-08 season.
But his numbers at the end of regulation and overtime since joining the Nets are truly staggering. In the final 30 seconds of regulation and overtime when the Nets are tied or trailing by three points or less, Johnson is an incredible 12-for-14 (85.7 percent) since the start of the 2012-13 season.
If you cut that down to the Nets being tied or trailing by three points or less in the final 10 seconds of regulation and overtime, Johnson is a perfect 6-for-6 since joining the Nets.
And while those numbers are obviously incredible, the significance of Johnson’s achievements in late-and-close situations since joining the Nets are even more staggering when you consider how much better he is than a selection of some of the league’s other top players over that same time frame, according to stats found on NBA.com:
Name, 30 seconds, 10 seconds
Joe Johnson, 12-for-14, 6-for-6
Dirk Nowitzki, 5-for-8, 2-for-4
LeBron James, 8-for-17, 4-for-11
Damian Lillard, 7-for-17, 6-for-15
Kobe Bryant, 4-for-11, 3-for-9
Kevin Durant, 4-for-12, 0-for-6
Kyrie Irving, 6-for-21, 5-for-16
LaMarcus Aldridge, 4-for-14, 2-for-9
Paul Pierce, 4-for-15, 2-for-12
Chris Paul, 2-for-8, 1-for-6
James Harden, 3-for-13, 2-for-7
Stephen Curry, 2-for-10, 1-for-7
Paul George, 1-for-11, 0-for-8
Carmelo Anthony, 1-for-16, 0-for-10
Now these numbers obviously come from a small sample size and vary wildly – for instance, Anthony’s numbers in late-and-close situations have been stellar for most of his career – so they aren’t meant to be used to disparage any of these players or to say they’re not “clutch.” Instead, it’s simply to show just how impressive Johnson has been in these situations for the Nets.
3. When Ibaka scored over Deron Williams to tie the game at 93 with 5.8 seconds remaining, there was a debate on press row as to which Net would be the one to take the last shot. Williams had been great in the second half, going 6-for-10 from the field (including going 4-for-5 from 3-point range), making him one option, and Paul Pierce, while not shooting great, was playing well and seemed to be another logical one.
The last time the Nets had been in this situation, on Dec. 20 in Philadelphia, they wound up getting a long jumper from Williams at the top of the key that missed in a game when Johnson was sitting out due to personal reasons.
And Johnson had struggled mightily throughout Thursday’s game, going 3-for-10 and scoring seven points through his first 30 minutes on the floor, missing several wide-open looks and being called for a few charges.
But what was remarkable after the game was how steadfast every player in the Nets locker room was that no matter what else had happened in the game, there was no chance anyone else would be shooting the ball in that spot instead of Johnson.
Nets coach Jason Kidd: “I didn’t think he was struggling. He was getting the ball. He delivered. You understand the personnel, and Joe delivered.”
Andrei Kirilenko: “I mean, if you have made like 10 out of the last 11, you’re going to take that shot. He feels it, and I know all the coaches know that, so every time there is a tie situation, we know who to look for. He proved it last year, and he keeps proving it.”
Shaun Livingston: “Man, that’s what veterans do. Joe, he’s known to be a big-game player, and the confidence he has in himself, we have that same confidence in him to bring us home. There’s nothing else really to be said about that.”
Paul Pierce: “We believe in him. He has the resume. When you have the resume, everybody’s trust is in him. You know, we trust him that he’s gonna get the good shot. It’s good to have a guy like that on your team.”
Deron Williams: “Man, it’s crazy. It didn’t matter what he did for the first 47 minutes … when the game is on the line, you know he wants the ball.”
Given how Johnson has performed in these situations as a Net, it’s hard to blame any of them for being so confident he would deliver.