The Nets are leaning toward later starting times again.
When Deron Williams lined up for his first Nets home game last week, Prudential Center was at least one-third empty. By the end of the night, an announced crowd of 15,836, still a non-sellout, filled the place.
Nets brass cringed at the “late-arriving crowd” although a victory-challenged team probably had just as much to do with it.
So to answer empty seats at the start of games as well as the NBA’s lowest home attendance for a second straight year, the Nets are headed toward returning to 7:30 p.m. starts — from 7 p.m. — next season, scheduled to be their last in Newark before the move to Brooklyn. The later start time should be formally adopted after the season.
The Nets flew 3,500 miles to find two sellouts in London over the weekend. Before those games, the Nets, 30th in attendance at The Rock with a draw of 13,207, had one sellout: against the Knicks Feb. 12.