Sixteen seconds into the fourth quarter, the hush that settled on Barclays Center was palpable. Jimmy Butler had just knocked down a 3-point shot, and the Chicago Bulls were within a point, and you could almost see the bad tidings forming in the thought bubbles above every one of the 17,732 heads in the building.
All of which boiled down to the same theme:
Oh, no.
“Neither one of us is getting all that far away from each other,” Nets coach P.J. Carlesimo would say later, shaking his head, the implication clear: What else did you expect.
And actually, here is what you can expect from the Nets, who would finally shake off the Bulls with a monstrous fourth-quarter splurge, dropping 33 points on the most ballyhooed batch of defensive grinders in the NBA: You can expect the man who plays center, and the man who plays point guard, to play the way they did last night.
You can expect Brook Lopez and Deron Williams to turn in the kind of effort they did with the Nets’ season on the brink, with Barclays baying for heroes, with the Brooklyn version of the Nets facing their first do-or-die, win-or-go-home, NCAA Tournament-style exam.
And delivering. Delivering in a big, bold, beautiful way.
In fact, this is what the Nets should believe for as long as this playoff season lasts, whether it ends Thursday night in Chicago or Saturday back here in Brooklyn, or whether they get a fresh set of downs against the Heat starting next week. They have an all-star center and an all-star point guard, and when they are playing to that pedigree there is never a reason to run scared.
“It would’ve been out of character for these guys not to respond tonight,” Carlesimo said.
That goes for his team, yes, but it especially applies to its engine and its motor, to Lopez and Williams, to the two big guns who allow you to believe that something special might still be lurking amid the residue of a nearly-broken season, both of them turning in double-doubles, both of them carrying the Nets in their hour of greatest need.
Lopez was 28 points and 10 rebounds, six of them on the offensive end, where the Bulls’ largess on the glass was especially galling to their coach, Tom Thibodeau. Williams had 23 points and 10 assists, and somehow managed to keep the annoying gnat opposite him, Nate Robinson, from being too destructive (even if Robinson did bring 20 points and eight assists in 44 minutes, having to work overtime thanks to the absence of Kirk Hinrich).
“We knew what we were facing,” Williams said. “We knew what the stakes were. And we knew we had to play as well as we can play.”
And they did that, Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside, the two of them making it clear that they did not intend to gently go into that good Brooklyn night, and bring their season with them.
“I don’t have a social life,” Lopez joked. “I like hanging out with these guys.”
And then, seriously: “I definitely didn’t want the season to end.”
And why would he? Five times he’s laced up his sneakers now in the playoffs, and five times he’s broken 20. He is one of the league’s great match-up problems anyway, but when he’s active and aggressive and looking for his shot and drilling his shot, he’s downright filthy.
And you match that with Williams …
“Huge,” Thibodeau said. “And we’ve got to come up with better answers.”
Those answers had better arrive for his Bulls sometime between now and Thursday, because in a series in which the momentum has yo-yo’d endlessly, it now belongs to the Nets, who have to know they can beat the Bulls in Chicago — especially minus Hinrich — because they did everything but beat them in Game 4.
It’s a mission more easily accomplished when you look on the floor and know you have the two best players playing for you. That’s what the Nets had last night. You keep that up, you might be staring at the South Florida sun fairly soon.
michael.vaccaro@nypost.com