The Brooklyn Nets are two games above .500 in mid-January.

Let that sink in.

The Nets are without question one of the Eastern Conference’s most exciting young teams. Today, Brooklyn faced off against the Sacramento Kings — who are equally as fun and equally as youthful as the Nets.

Trailing the Kings at the half, the Nets used a massive third-quarter offensive barrage to silence Sacramento. D’Angelo Russell — coming off a 40-point performance against Orlando — showed no signs of fatigue. His effort this afternoon led the Nets to their fourth consecutive victory.

The Nets — who got off to a dreadful start Friday against Orlando — changed their gameplan to an aggressive attacking style. Brooklyn, particularly Rodions Kurucs, got to the rim at will in the first. The rookie put up eight points in the opening quarter — six of those were in the paint. But the Kings matched Brooklyn’s energy, as the Nets ended the quarter up 29-23.

Both the Kings and the Nets have outstanding scoring benches on the year and, early on, it was much of the same story. The Kings challenged Brooklyn’s Spencer Dinwiddie, DeMarre Carroll, and Ed Davis with Bogdan Bogdanovic, Justin Jackson, and Marvin Bagely Jr. And in the first half, Sacramento outscored Brooklyn’s bench 30-18, partly thanks to their nearly league-leading pace. The Nets, generally the dominators in this statistic, were taken aback by their inability to depend on the bench.

Trailing 60-55 at the half, Brooklyn would need to do a better job contesting Sacramento’s shots as the visitors shot 52% from the field. And despite out-rebounding the Kings by eleven, the Nets held a field goal percentage under 40 — yikes!

However, as we all know by now, a five-point halftime deficit doesn’t scare Brooklyn. And at this point, one could argue that a halftime deficit is preferable to a lead for the Nets.

D’Angelo Russell seems to agree.

The newly-crowned Eastern Conference Player of the Week caught fire in the third, scoring 14 points. Russell powered the Nets to a 93-85 lead at the end of the third — they outscored the Kings 38-25 in the quarter.

Thankfully, the fourth quarter was no different. With a strong defensive effort, Brooklyn buried Sacramento. The Nets allowed nine points in the fourth, propelling them to a 29-point victory margin — 123-94.

Since December 7th, the Nets own the best record in the NBA (17-5).

Sitting at 25-23, the Nets are set to rematch the Magic on Wednesday night in Brooklyn. And if they play as they did this afternoon, a win shouldn’t be hard to come by.