Well, that one will linger.
The Brooklyn Nets spent almost the entire night in control Saturday in Georgia, built a 17-point first-quarter cushion and still walked off the floor with a 124-121 loss to the Atlanta Hawks. Brooklyn led until the final two minutes, then watched the game slip away late as the Hawks finished the job.
There was plenty to like in the loss. Nolan Traore got Brooklyn rolling early, Mikel Brown Jr. delivered in the fourth quarter, and Day’Ron Sharpe turned in his first triple-double. But none of that was enough to change the ending, and the Nets dropped to 2-7 while continuing to struggle to close games.
Brooklyn came out blazing and put up 37 points in the opening quarter, racing to a 37-27 lead. The shot-making was sharp right away: the Nets hit 14 of 19 from the field and went 6 of 10 from deep. The ball kept moving too, with 11 assists on 14 made baskets and eight different players getting on the scoreboard as the lead grew to as many as 17.
Atlanta started clawing back before the quarter was over, and by halftime the margin had shrunk to four, 70-66. The biggest problem for Brooklyn was self-inflicted.
The Nets had 11 turnovers in the first half, and those mistakes turned into 15 Hawks points. Atlanta also pounded the paint, outscoring Brooklyn 42-22 inside before the break and piling up 39 paint points in the second quarter alone.
Even with the giveaways, the Nets were still scoring at a high clip. Michael Porter Jr. had 18 points in the first half, while Traore continued his strong start to the season with 15 points on 6-of-7 shooting.
Sharpe was active as a playmaker as well, collecting eight assists before halftime. He had set a career high with eight assists on Wednesday, and by Saturday that number had climbed to 13, along with 12 points and 10 rebounds for his first triple-double.
The odd part: Brooklyn shot 65.7% from the field and 50% from three in the first half and still only led by four. The turnovers made the difference.
After the break, Brooklyn steadied itself. The Nets won the third quarter 25-22 and carried a 95-88 lead into the fourth.
The offense wasn’t as clean, but the defense tightened up enough to keep Atlanta from fully taking over the game. Jordi Fernández made adjustments at halftime, and Brooklyn’s lead survived into the final period.
Then Brown Jr. took over late. He had missed his first seven shots and entered the fourth with just five points, but he caught fire when it mattered most, knocking down three big threes and finishing with 18. While Brown Jr. was carrying the offense, Traore did not play in the fourth quarter.
Brooklyn still held the lead until 1:26 remained. Then the Hawks finally moved in front, and the Nets never scored again. The result was a 124-121 defeat that felt especially painful because Brooklyn had controlled the game for so long.
The late collapse came with more turnover trouble too. The Nets added six more giveaways in the fourth quarter, part of a night that again showed how much work this young group still has to do to finish games.
Sharpe’s night stood out beyond the box score. He became the first Nets center to record a triple-double, finishing with 12 points, 10 rebounds and 13 assists.
The 13 assists were also a record for a Nets 5. It was Brooklyn’s first triple-double in nearly a year, and Nic Claxton had the previous one for the team last December with 14 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists after Sharpe replaced him in the starting lineup this season.
Brooklyn won’t have much time to dwell on it. The Nets head to Dallas on Sunday for the second game of their back-to-back, facing a Mavericks team that is 5-4 after beating the Utah Jazz 112-100 on Friday.
After letting this one get away, Brooklyn will try again to put together a full 48 minutes. That has been the issue most often this season, and Saturday’s loss was another painful reminder.
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Nets Rotation Faces Heat After A Loss Brooklyn Should Have Closed
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Then the closing stretch turned into the kind of loss that tends to linger in a locker room and in the film room. The 124-121 defeat to Atlanta left Brooklyn sorting through player grades and individual performances, but the bigger concern is harder to grade: how a game that was there to be closed slipped away when it mattered most. [Read more 🡒]
Julius Randle May Have Just Changed Brooklyns Late-Game Rotation
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Julius Randle still did his part with 22 points, but he also showed the kind of selflessness coaches love when a game starts tilting in the right direction. The bigger question now is whether Fernndez treats that stretch as a one-off adjustment or the start of a new closing formula, especially with Wolf and Mann making a strong case to stay in the mix when games tighten up. [Read more 🡒]