3 things to watch for from Nets in final 24 games of season

The Brooklyn Nets will finally return to the hardwood on Friday for their first game after the NBA All-Star break. They spent Thursday practicing at their Brooklyn training facility and know there’s a large task in front of them in the final 24 games of the season.

The Nets went into the break with a win and will look to come out of it the same way, but in the bigger scheme of things there will be a few things to watch during the stretch run. It’s no secret that the Nets are still trying to build their chemistry after a massive shake-up right before the trade deadline.

But that is only one of a few things on the Nets’ plate. Here are 3 things to watch going forward.

Nic Claxton’s usage

It can’t be understated how important Nic Claxton has been to the Nets this season and is arguably their second or third-best player. However, as the season continued and the break came closer and closer, the impact the minutes that Claxton had been playing became more and more apparent.

Nets head coach Jacque Vaughn played him under 30 minutes in the final three games before the break and scored double-digit points just once in that span. And his rebounds also dipped during that time.

The break helped Claxton get rejuvenated after a trip to the Virgin Islands, but he told reporters on Thursday that he hadn’t spoken to Vaughn about his minutes going forward.

“I’ll just be ready for whatever. The break definitely got me right, though,” Claxton said.

The 29.5 minutes per game that he has been averaging this season is far and away a new career high for Claxton. Vaughn said that the key now is finding the right way to use him. The Nets coach said it was about using him strategically going forward.

“Using him in back-to-backs, what that looks like for us,” Vaughn explained. “Some games, we’ll be dedicated to just — maybe this is a game where he plays less minutes so that we can play the next three at his normal minutes. So we’ll continue to see how he feels, but the most important thing is continue to keep him fresh for the stretch.”

Who is the Nets’ ‘closer’

In their win over the Miami Heat, the Nets saw Mikal Bridges be the closer that the team needed after the departure of Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving. But don’t expect Brooklyn to have just one player that will be their go-to guy in crunch time. The makeup of the Nets has clearly changed and that means it could come down to anyone on any given night to step up in those big moments.

Spencer Dinwiddie nearly had that moment in the Nets’ loss to Philadelphia and he claimed to have the most game-winning shots in the league. “Aye, most in the league, so you tee me up, it’s a bucket,” he said.

But the Nets seem confident going forward with anybody stepping up in that moment when the team needs it.

“We’re all (players) at the end of the day and nobody on this team is scared of (the big) moment,” Bridges said. “I just think (if) people have it going and I think we’re all going to be ready. So it really doesn’t matter Just like I said it’s about who’s hot at the time or something, but nobody’s scared of (the) moment on this team and just everybody be ready.”

The Chemistry

Vaughn has the unenviable task of trying to create cohesion among the team while trying to keep the Nets in a good playoff position down the stretch. The foundation was already being set before the break, but Vaughn has been focusing more and more on it since the team reconvened in Brooklyn this week.

The Nets coach laid out to reporters the three things that he wanted to see from his team post-All-Star break and that has clearly been part of the messaging in practice.

“Attention to detail, focus and just a general effort. He wants no team to play harder than us,” Dinwiddie explained about Vaughn’s messaging at practice. “He wants us to impose our will both offensively and defensively just with a level of intensity, and understand that we’re gonna make mistakes. We’re a group that doesn’t know each other and that’s kind of a way to bypass some of the mishaps that have happened.”