The Nets made it hard on themselves, but they eventually found a way to put away the hapless Bobcats last night.
Their sloppy performance in a 105-96 victory in front of 17,444 at Barclays Center notwithstanding, it was expected a playoff team like the Nets would beat the Bobcats, the league’s worst team, at home.
Of greater concern to interim coach P.J. Carlesimo were the losses the Nets suffered in their two previous games in Brooklyn against the Hawks and Bulls.
Both games — against the Nets’ two most likely first-round opponents in the playoffs — were squandered opportunities to secure home-court advantage in the first round and send a message to their potential postseason opponents.
“It’s a major concern,” Carlesimo said. “We’re just not playing well enough right now to be as successful as we want to be in the playoffs. We’ve got to play better.
“You’re not going to win every game, you’re not going to play perfectly, but that was two games that were really big games for us — and there was no question about it. It’s not like they snuck up on us. … We knew they were big games. Atlanta was a chance to win that series and Chicago was a chance to take it to the second level of tiebreaker, and we didn’t do either one.”
The Nets (44-32) nearly didn’t do it against the Bobcats (18-59) either. They were sluggish and sloppy throughout the game, letting balls slip through their fingers at both ends, not going after rebounds and settling too often for 3-pointers (5-for-21).
Luckily for them, they received yet another virtuoso performance from Deron Williams, who finished with 32 points on 11-for-18 shooting to go along with six assists. Williams hit a key bucket with just over a minute remaining that put the Nets up 97-94 after a pair of 3-pointers from Mount Vernon product and former UConn star Ben Gordon — who led Charlotte with 27 points — cut the lead to 95-94.
Williams drove to the hoop and was fouled on the ensuing possession, sinking a pair of free throws with 48.7 seconds left. That gave the Nets a five-point cushion and allowed them to breathe a sigh of relief as they avoided what would have been an embarrassing loss.
The Nets have won just three of their past eight games in Brooklyn including last night’s win, continuing a season-long trend of play at home below the standard of a typical playoff team. The Nets entered last night’s game with the sixth-best home record among Eastern Conference playoff teams and a worse one than every single Western Conference playoff squad.
The Nets have three games remaining at home — all against sub-.500 teams — as they try to hold off the Bulls, who at 42-33 are one game back of the Nets in the loss column, and the Hawks, who entered last night two back, for fourth place in the East, which would give them home-court advantage in Round 1.
“It’s important that we get all of these,” Williams said. “We have to give our fans something to get excited about. We need to get this home-court advantage, and that starts with us protecting these games at home.
“For some reason, we’ve at times struggled at home. There’s not really an answer for it, there’s not a reason for it. We’ve got to come out and play better.”
***Kris Humphries was a late scratch fwith sinus congestion. … Chrisandthecapper, the horse named after the Nets’ radio team of Chris Carrino and Tim Capstraw, led early in the Wood Memorial at Aqueduct yesterday before fading to sixth place.
tbontemps@nypost.com