The Brooklyn Net and Dallas Mavericks each faced a far more daunting opponent than each other before tonight. For those unaware, Mother Nature dumped over a foot of snow on New York City Sunday afternoon through Monday morning. Unable to fly in ahead of time, neither team arrived in the Big Apple before this morning.
Pregame, Jason Kidd couldn’t remember a time where he had to travel and play in the same day since his days running point for the team he’d coach against this evening.
“I think with the
Nets, we flew from here to Phoenix and played Phoenix the same day,” Kidd recalled. “It was a snowstorm — we sat on a plane, couldn’t get out, stayed at a hotel and then left in the morning. I think we were in that game for the first quarter and then fatigue set in. So yes, I’ve been in something like this.”
Outside of that anecdote, Kidd downplayed the whole ordeal, mentioning that they had a good practice yesterday and that the team spirit remained positive. Brooklyn also seemed to make the best of the situation.
“T-Mann [Terance Mann] put together an outing to aquarium, and that was pretty awesome,” Jordi Fernández said. “Pretty much all the guys went there. I asked them questions about their favorite things that they saw. It was pretty good.”
Atlanta’s marine life seemed to rub off on Brooklyn. In the tank race, the Nets were swimming upstream tonight. Brooklyn came into the contest vs Dallas with a clean injury report while teams like the Indiana Pacers and Washington Wizards hid half their rotations on the bench tonight. The Mavericks, meanwhile, benefitted from injuries to Cooper Flagg, Kyrie Irving, and Derick Lively.
That said, Brooklyn’s advantage (strictly on the floor…not in long term team-building) took a while to take form. The Nets fell behind early after after starting the game 5-13 from the field, even after Michael Porter Jr. opened 3-3.
But aside from the misses, Brooklyn’s offense did look a tad more fluid, and at the very least, just entertaining to watch tonight. They assisted on four of those first five makes. Brooklyn doubled up on their bigs in the pick-and-roll early, with Noah Clowney and Nic Claxton screening for each other before Day’Ron Sharpe and Danny Wolf did so later in the first.
Despite Brooklyn’s early investment in size, it was Dallas who initially saw greater returns on the interior. Fueled by Daniel Gafford and Marvin Bagley, who combined to for 13 on 5-8 shooting, the Mavericks scored 20 points in the paint during the first quarter, outscoring the Nets there by six. Dallas also maintained a rebounding advantage into the second. As a result, the Nets finished the first down 36-29.
When the teams swapped baskets, Dallas’ approach switched as well. Klay Thompson made three triples less than three minutes into the second to give Dallas a double digit lead. Bagley also continued to have his way with Claxton, adding seven more points in the frame to lead his team with 14 at halftime.
Claxton’s front court mate did his best to keep Brooklyn within striking distance. Clowney banged three triples in the second, one of which Clax even assisted on…
However, Brooklyn remained behind even as Claxton and Clowney looked to make up for their team’s paint passivity at the other end. Claxton had a game-high seven dimes by halftime and Brooklyn even managed to shoot 60.5% from the field in the first two periods. Regardless, Dallas maintained a 76-64 lead, shooting even better from the field (64.4%) and a full touchdown ahead on the glass (21-14).
Even after the Mavs scored a the first four points of the second half, putting a daunting 80-64 score on the board at one point, Brooklyn kept the deficit in the 8-10 point range for much of the third. Brooklyn’s veteran though not exactly “old” group did the bulk work. Through three, Porter Jr., Claxton, and Clowney had 57 points, shooting 21-29 from the field and 6-8 on threes. The seven other Nets combined for just 34 points, shooting 13-32 from the field and 4-15 from deep. Egor Dëmin looked in danger of going scoreless for the the second time this season, having zero points to his name at the start of the fourth after missing all five of his shots thus far.
Of course, the first Net to reach double figures outside those three was the oldest guy on the team. Terance Mann who did so with a buttery mid-range finish early in the fourth. After leading his teammates to an eventful layover day in the ATL, he took charge again in the fourth, putting in 10 quick points in the period’s first five minutes and even make it a basket difference at one point.
But despite Mann’s productivity, Fernández opted to close with his original staring five, which included Traoré and Dëmin, who were a collective 4-17 by that point.
And while Dëmin finally broke the seal with a little over three to go in the game, the Nets couldn’t do the same with Dallas’ offense. The Mavs continued to switch Claxton and Traoré on defense, putting the latter in the paint and the Nets at a size disadvantage. Whether it was a Dallas big finished over Nolan, or the team working the ball around to find an open man after the Nets sent help, the Mavs slowly but surely rebuilt their lead down the stretch.
In the end, the issues the plagued Brooklyn from the start came back to bite them. They lost 44-28 on the glass and were -16 in the paint.
They did, however, and even while swimming upstream, secure a potentially important loss.
Final: Dallas Mavericks 123, Brooklyn Nets 114
Next Up
The Nets will get their second and final shot of the season at the San Antonio Spurs on Thursday night. Brooklyn visited and lost to the Spurs in their third game, way back in late October. San Antonio will play this one as the latter half of a back-to-back sequence, but they’ve also won nine in a row. This one tips off at 7:30 p.m. EST at the Barclays Center.
