Nets win and lose by beating the GS Warriors 102-100
The New Jersey Nets are not in the running any longer for a playoff spot at this point but they had some payback in mind for the Pacers who have beaten them badly multiple times this year. The Pacers visited the Rock last night and witnessed the 21st different starting lineup of the year for the NJ. The Williams frontcourt tandem will not be playing with Shelden out with an eye injury and Jordan out with concussion like symptoms. (cautious move by the Nets)
The Nets opened up the game in the first quarter by allowing David Lee to score 14 points with many in the paint and Deron Williams tried to offset that by dishing out 7 assists in the first. NJ struggled to clog the paint area and went down by 10 as Humphries and Petro could not handle Lee along with Deron having problems putting the ball in the basket. Williams went into the locker room with zero points (but still dropping dimes) at half as the Nets shot 35% from the field/ 5-11 from 3pt range while David Lee had 23 points to pace the Warriors to a 51-42 intermission.
The second half started no better for NJ when Golden State got multiple run out dunks to push the lead to 19 with 3 minutes left in the third quarter. The Nets lost the quarter 33-28 to fall behind 84-70 but rebounded the ball well and kept the defensive intensity led by Gerald Wallace to make a run in the 4th and keep it a game. Wallace had 2 big steals late in the game and with two minutes remaining in the game Deron Williams (9pts/20ast) hit a huge 3 to bring the game it 98-97. Gerald Green dunked on a baseline drive with under a minute to play and followed that up with another dribble drive to launch a 3 ft floater to give the Nets a 102-100 lead with 8.7 to play. Gerald Wallace (24 pts/18 rebs/4 ast/6stl and 1 blk) finished his stellar night with a block of the last second shot by Chris Jenkins. The Nets outscored the Warriors 32-16 in 4th and finished off their biggest 4th quarter comeback in some time.
Gerald Wallace – “The future looks good, if we had everybody healthy,” Wallace said after the Nets opened a four-game West Coast trip with their first win at Oracle Arena in more than six years. “We have an elite point guard, we have one of the up-and-coming centers … so our future looks great.”
Notes: 1st time all year that 3 Nets players have 20 or more points in same game – Wallace-Green-Humpries
By winning the game vs Golden State the Nets change their odds for the lottery a bit by moving from 4th to 5th.
Nets go for 3 in a row Saturday Night in Sacramento @ 10pm
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