The final score of this game won’t show you how close this game actually was. The Nets had a 48-46 lead on the Lakers at the half, and they effectively silenced the pro-Laker crowd. Now all of the reporters covering the game are going to talk about how the Lakers took the first half off, and that was the only way that the Nets were in it. I hate that excuse. The Nets went out and worked their butt off in the first half, they can’t control how hard the Lakers play. But, maybe the Lakers were taking it easy on the defensive end, but that doesn’t take away from the Nets’ effort defensively, they only have up 46 points in the first half, including a 17 point quarter for the Lakers.
For at least one quarter last night, we saw glimpses of the old Devin. In the second quarter he was 7-7 from the field including a 3, totaling 17 points. Other guys for the Nets were scoring, Brook was doing his thing and CDR was effective as well, all of a sudden, Devin went off. After his spurt though, he was effectively shut down for the rest of the game. This just shows that Devin can’t be the number 1 guy on a basketball team. That isn’t a bad thing though, and it doesn’t mean that Devin is a bad player, it is hard though to get open looks as a PG when you are the guy bringing up the basketball. Hopefully, when there is more talent on this team, this is how Devin is going to operate, distribute the ball and as the defense starts to focus on everyone else, he will be able to get to the lane and do his thing.
After the game, I thought I was going to have to talk about how Brook struggled, but then I looked at the boxscore to see he was 6-16 with 18 points and 11 rebounds. I love how off-nights for Brook end up being double-doubles. This was a game where it was hard for Brook to be dominant. At first the Lakers were playing him straight up with Bynum, but after he got in foul trouble, they were matching Pau on Brook and sending Lamar Odom on a double. That is two 7-footers, and that didn’t allow Brook much room to operate. He was patient when he got the ball, made his move, and was somewhat effective. Oh and his passes out of the high post are awesome. After the jump, check out a few bullets:
- Maybe I am being too positive, but I loved the performance from the Nets. If they can carry this over to Minnesota on Wed. I think they come away with a win.
- Why did we lose? Well besides the fact that the Lakers are really good, they out rebounded the Nets by 11, and they had 15 more assists than the Nets.
- CDR mentioned in his post game interview that X-rays were negative, and that the ankle should be fine. Will he be ready to go for Wed? I am not sure, it looked really bad.
- Josh Boone played pretty well last night, but there are just some things he does that really bothers me. Most of it is just lack of fundamentals. For example, he grabbed a rebound, passed it before he looked, and ended up handing it to Lamar Odom.
- Terrence Williams didn’t get too many minutes last night, but I think that was by design. The Lakers are great on the ball defenders, and T-Will would have struggled getting in the lane. Kiki doesn’t want him to revert to shoot-happy Terrence, so he kept him out of the game.
