There’s no time like the present for the Nets to turn their fortunes around. And with less than 10 games to go after Thursday’s rematch against the Cleveland Cavaliers there really isn’t much time left for them.
The Nets are flirting with falling into a play-in round spot after they lost four straight games heading into Thursday night and sat in a tie with the Miami Heat. None of that is good for Brooklyn, who had been near the top of the table just a few months ago.
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Even after trading away both of their superstars, it looked as though they could avoid falling far enough into a dreaded play-in round spot. However, things have hit a critical point for the Nets, who have stated that the expectations haven’t changed since Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving were traded around the deadline in February.
The Nets have struggled to firmly find their identity since then, though, and have gone 7-11 since then. More recently they’ve struggled to win the battle along the glass and even when they have, their shooting has caused issues.
Tuesday’s loss to the Cavaliers highlight that when the Nets outrebounded the Cavaliers, but struggled from the floor and in particular from beyond the arc.
“The biggest thing that’s hovering over us is trying to get a win,” Nets coach Jacque Vaughn told the New York Post on Wednesday. “That’s the most important thing. I don’t think we complicate it any more than that. Pretty simple as a team with our motives and what our goals are, and that’s to win the next game. We don’t know what the standings are going to look like at the end of this thing. On a nightly basis it’s changing.
Getting wins won’t be an easy task for the Nets either. Outside of their final game with the Cavaliers, the Nets have an even bigger game brewing with the very same Heat they’re trying to stay in front of on Saturday.
After that, only Detroit, Orlando and Houston are the only ones that don’t find themselves in a spot to compete to play in the postseason that the Nets will face down the stretch. The Utah Jazz are sitting in 11th in the Western Conference going into Thursday’s slate of games.
That means the Nets need to find a way to put as much space between themselves and a spot in the play-in round as they can. If Brooklyn slips into the seventh spot they’d have to face the Atlanta Hawks in the play-in round just to make it into the playoffs.
That would not be an ideal situation for the Nets.
As Vaughn has typically done this season he tried to look at the positive of the Nets’ current situation.
“At the end of the day, that’s the great thing about basketball, it teaches you life lessons also. What do you do? For us, we have four losses in a row. Are you defeated? Or do you realize who you are?” he said.
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