The Nets expect to get scoring from Deron Williams, Joe Johnson and Brook Lopez on a nightly basis. But if Gerald Wallace can continue to give them anywhere near the production he did in their comfortable victory over the Bulls in Game 1 Saturday night in Brooklyn, what was expected to be a long and competitive first-round series could quickly become a short one.
Wallace, mired in a brutal slump over the past several weeks, went 5-for-7 from the field and finished with 14 points to reach double figures for the first time since scoring 12 in Portland in late March.
“I’m [feeling] pretty good,” Wallace said. “It’s a fresh start, a new season. … The playoffs are totally different.”
Wallace looked like a totally different player Saturday than the one who had been shooting 33.5 percent from the field and 13.5 percent from 3-point range since the All-Star break. The Nets hope to see that Wallace again when the teams reconvene at Barclays Center for Game 2 tonight.
Because of Wallace’s struggles, the Bulls often had Kirk Hinrich, their starting point guard, matched up on him defensively, allowing Chicago to put its long, athletic wings — Jimmy Butler and Luol Deng — on Williams and Johnson. But instead of being passive offensively, as Wallace often has been of late during his shooting struggles, he took advantage of the matchup at every opportunity, using his size and quickness to attack the paint to get layups or to the foul line, where he went 3-for-5.
“My main thing was to try to be more aggressive and put pressure on their defense, force them into situations where they have to guard,” Wallace said. “They probably didn’t see that in the first four games that we played, so it’s probably something new to them and forced them to do something they didn’t want to do defensively.”
It also helped Wallace that the Nets were able to get out in transition and get easy baskets. Wallace picked up a pair of them that way — one when he stole the ball from Richard Hamilton and another when Williams hit him with a beautiful pass to set up a gliding layup.
“That’s what we talked about,” Williams said of getting out in transition more. “It suits me, it suits [Wallace], it suits a lot of our guys. I can get him more involved. We have to get up and down and not let them get set up, get out in transition where he can be active.”
Wallace’s work against Deng on the defensive end was just as important. Wallace was defending Deng on 10 of his 11 shot attempts Saturday, according to mysynergysports.com, and held Deng to six points on 3-for-10 shooting.
“He could’ve had zero [points] last night and he still would’ve been a major contributor in the game,” interim coach P.J. Carlesimo said. “He’s going to play big minutes.
“We’re not going to win without Gerald Wallace playing big minutes, regardless of what his [stat] line is.”