NBA

Sweet homecoming for Nets’ Morrow

CHARLOTTE, N.C.– For three quarters, Anthony Morrow was, well, home. Back in his home town for the second time in a week, the Nets’ shooting guard had family and friends in the stands, folks who had come out to see him play and do something. It took a while for Morrow to deliver.

But it was worth the wait.

Morrow scored all 17 of his points in the fourth quarter of the Nets’ 83-74 victory over the Bobcats Friday night, 10 of them coming in a 3:31 stretch that left the Nets ahead eight with 6:40 to play. The Bobcats made a run but Morrow delivered the dagger with a 3-pointer at 1:14.

“Anthony was just so huge for us in the second half,” coach Avery Johnson said. “We’ve been trying a lot of different ways to get him shots so we talked about it at halftime. Keep it simple. So we kind of gave him some post up looks, some isolation looks and he made the defense pay.”

And put smiles on the faces of family and friends.

“It was great,” Morrow said. “It’s a nice feeling to come home and win in front of my mom and dad and family and get that win on the road. … We’ve been fighting through adversity all season with injuries and all kinds of stuff. It’s just that we’re sticking together. We’ve got great team chemistry on and off the court.”

***

Deron Williams pulled out an “Old School” reference when discussing the Nets’ hopes of making a playoff run.

“We want to go streakin’. In the quad. Everybody’s doing it,” Williams said, channeling his best Will Ferrell. “We need to put together some wins here especially if we want to make a playoff run. “The schedule coming up is pretty favorable to us, if we play like we’re capable of playing.”

Williams is not the only guy thinking playoffs.

“We’ve been looking at it,” DeShawn Stevenson said of the standings – the Nets ended Friday night 4¹/₂ games behind the eighth-place Knicks. “Coach has this thing where we’ve got to win seven out of 10 games. … Ever since Coach has been saying that, we’ve been playing harder so it’s on our minds so that’s definitely a goal.”

***

Johnson’s take on Deron Williams’ sore calf that will keep him out against Houston tonight at least.

“He’s going to get re-evaluated [Saturday],” Johnson said. “Hopefully we’ll get some good news but in the meantime, other guys will have to step up which they did tonight.”

***

Corey Maggette led the Bobcats with 19 points, while Bismack Biyombo had an 11-point, 11-rebound double-double. … The Nets have not had a 3-game win streak this season but are 4-2 since the All-Star Break.

***

Mehmet Okur, we hardly knew ye.

Okur, obtained in pre-season after Brook Lopez broke his foot, has been declared out indefinitely by the Nets with a lower back ailment that limited him to just 17 games. Okur last played Jan. 25. It does not sound optimistic for a return this season.

“The back situation has not responded at all. We’ve tried a little bit of everything,” Avery Johnson said. “We’ve just taken the pressure off of him. We just don’t have a time frame now. We’ll just continue to treat him.

“We treat him, we rest him and then he goes out on the floor and tries to shoot a little bit, or we get him on the bike, then there’s a major setback in the terms of how he recovers.

“So right now, he’s out indefinitely and we don’t know what that means, we don’t know if it’s four more weeks, five more weeks, the rest of the season. Indefinite is just indefinite and we’ll keep treating him.”

Johnson said surgery does not appear to be an option for the 6-foot-11, 10th-season veteran.

“From what the doctors are saying right now, surgery is not the answer. It’s just complete rest,” Johnson said.

***

Charlotte coach Paul Silas said the Bobcats’ intent Friday night was to make sure Deron Williams did not duplicate his historic 57-point effort of Sunday. Well, Williams sore right calf which limited him to just 15 first half minutes and seven points made the trap him high strategy moot.

“We’re going to try to take the ball out of his hands as much as we can. He posted up against us a lot,” Silas said before the game, noting the lack of point guard size and two guard speed by the Bobcats made one-on-one hard. “And we’ve got to come at him. We just can’t have him going one-on-one against us as he did the last time and expect him not to go off on us again.

“Everybody has got to be aware and we weren’t the last game. But we were in the game so it didn’t matter as much.”

***

Johnson had special praise for Gerald Green.

“He blocked shots, he contested shots inside,” he said. “He rebounded for us. We needed his length and athleticism. He’s really been good for us. He’s playing better on the defensive end than he ever did early in his career and that’s a sign of progress for him,” Johnson said.

Green, though, said he was concerned only about the win.

“Oh, man, this feels good,” said Green, renewed Thursday on a second 10-day contract. “For me it’s all just so crazy because I’m just now getting here, so I’m just excited.

“I’m excited about being here and you can tell everybody’s happy and things are going good and stuff, so I’m just glad to be a part of it.”

fred.kerber@nypost.com