The Brooklyn Nets are still looking for a defensive identity, offensive consistency, and of course, their first win of the season. The Indiana Pacers had no interest in aiding the search Sunday evening.
Brooklyn started with the same five again tonight. Held out for back injury maintenance, Mikel Brown Jr. wasn’t even an option.
Brooklyn’s defense was a mixed bag in the first. The team did well getting into the Pacer passing lanes, coming away with seven steals in the period. While Keon Ellis was the lead
bandit out there today, coming away with four steals for the game, Josh Minott also got involved for a second straight game after riding bench for the entirety of the season opener. He poked away a steal of his own almost immediately after checking into the game.
However, Brooklyn’s tendency to throw two at the ball paired with Indiana’s collective ability to move the rock and find the low man also brought trouble.
While Brooklyn’s defense, particularly the rim around the rim, hasn’t been anything to rave about so far this year, this wasn’t the afternoon to be critical of Mo Wagner and Day’Ron Sharpe. The bigs essentially carried the Nets in the game’s first 15 minutes, combing for 16 points while shooting 6-8 from the field. Wagner was a +9 in his first stint off the bench.
Michael Porter Jr. and Julius Randle had a combined two points on 1-6 shooting during that stretch. So, yeah, they needed that.
Brooklyn still led by a few at the start of and early into the second, but Indiana never let the separate and eventually caught them midway through the frame. They had little success distancing themselves on the scoreboard as well until the half’s final two and a half minutes, where Indiana hit a flurry of threes to carve out a nine point advantage.
At that point, Randle and Porter Jr. had mustered a combined 12 points, but were still shooting 2-14 from the field. Mo Wagner led Brooklyn with 13 points after shooting 5-7 from the field and 2-2 from deep. Ellis and Sharpe each had nine.
Those triples for Indiana turned out to be the first few drips of a flood soon to break through. The Pacers opened up the second half shooting 4-6 from deep to give themselves a 16-point lead. Getting down the floor in a hurry after Brooklyn’s misses, they had an easy time finding space for their shooters with the Nets often looking a step or two behind.
This time, Mo Wagner couldn’t save them. After Brooklyn’s bench unit checked in, the Pacers inflated their lead to 26 points with 3:19 to go in the third. The Nets also stopped turning Indiana over, only to start giving away possessions themselves, committing five turnovers in the third. They shot 8-23 from the field and 1-8 from deep during the period too.
Those are a lot of negative figures, and the scoreboard has nowhere to hid them, as the Nets quickly went down 26 with with 3:19 to play. That’s also when Danny Wolf checked in for his first minutes of the season. Drake Powell got his shortly after as well. Before you knew it, we were again settling for developmental minutes with a legitimate game now beyond our reach.
In that consolation contest, Traoré led the way, tallying with 17 points and five assists while shooting 6-11 from the field and 2-3 from three. He finished as Brooklyn’s leading scorer. Powell and Wolf both played the entire fourth quarter but offered little to write about. Wolf made two threes. Powell did not score but assisted on two baskets.
Joshua Jefferson did get his first NBA minutes, but not points. He came in for the affair’s final three minutes, missing his lone shot attempt, a three from the corner.
With none of the starters playing in the fourth, Porter Jr. finished with 10 points while shooting 4-13 from the field and 0-5 from deep. Randle also had 10 points along with seven rebound and seven assists. Egor Dëmin struggled as well. The pendulum appeared to swing back the other tonight after his game against Cleveland last night. Dëmin added just three points tonight while shooting 1-6 from the field.
Back-to-backs are always going to be tough, as will getting wins against expected playoff teams for this young Nets squad. However, in a season where it finally felt like winning could be on the table, you can’t help but feel disappointed with an 0-3 start.
The search continues.
Final: Indiana Pacers 136, Brooklyn Nets 109
Milestone Watch
- Keon Ellis recorded four steals in the first half tonight against Indiana, which tied his career high for steals in a half (fourth time). It is the seventh time that a Net has had 4+ STL in the first half of a game since Shaun Livingston had five on 2/3/14 vs. PHI.
Injury Update
Jordi Fernández confirmed pregame that nothing new has changed or come up with Mikel Brown Jr.’s back. He was held out today purely for precautionary reasons. Fernández said that he’d be “ready to go” next time out. Speaking of…
Next Up
The Nets will play their first inter-divisional game on Tuesday night in Boston. It’ll be the latter half of a back-to-back sequence for the Celtics, so Brooklyn might have a better shot to pull off an upset than the matchup alone indicates. The Nets have lost 11 of their last 12 to the boys from bean town.
