Future Looks Bright for 'Brooklyn Basketball' as Nets Rout Jazz
It seemed a bit strange this week to hear the Nets were harping on the need to go back to playing 'Brooklyn basketball.' This was a team, remember, that admitted it did not have a true identity last year, and the current group has an overwhelming newness about it.
But if Brooklyn basketball looks anything like it did Tuesday, the team's erratic beginning, its 1-2 start, will become a distant memory. Center Brook Lopez, stamping his feet into the lane and swaying his tree-branch arms, scored 27 easy points. Point guard Deron Williams dipped and bopped and swaggered around the floor during his most confident showing since he sprained his right ankle this summer.
The Nets, eager to bounce back from a feeble showing Sunday night in Orlando, did so with style as they brushed aside the Utah Jazz, 104-88, at Barclays Center.
While trying to achieve some chemistry, the Nets have looked lukewarm, losing two games to untried opponents. The players said they were being too passive, perhaps, while trying to accommodate one another.
But they looked plenty assertive Tuesday, never trailing and never taking their foot off the gas. Six Nets players finished with double figures in points, and the team shot 51.3 percent from the field.
On defense, the Nets set out to be more proactive than they were during their loss Sunday, to dictate the play on their own end rather than adjusting to their opponents. This was apparent from the get-go. They were quick to put bodies onto Jazz players, harassing Utah into eight first-quarter turnovers, from which they produced 8 points.
And on the other side, Lopez, as he has every game this season, established himself early on, scoring 19 first-half points - muscling repeatedly to the basket, letting out a tortured yell almost every time - as the Nets shot 20 for 34 in the first half. Lopez poured in his 27 points in 25 minutes, adding seven rebounds, two steals and one block.
Most encouraging for the Nets may have been Williams's game. He had 10 points, 8 assists and 2 steals in 25 minutes. But more than the numbers, the aesthetics told the story. He showed that life was returning to his legs, looking as spry as he has since training camp began. His movement was more assured, his passing more effective.
Williams's progress in his return from the sprained right ankle he sustained this summer was best exemplified during the third quarter. With 5 minutes 10 seconds remaining, Williams spun his way into space to undo the Jazz defense and fired a no-look pass to Andray Blatche, who went up for an easy dunk. On the Nets' next possession, Williams sauntered up the floor and put the ball once through his legs, before careening into the lane and flipping up a one-handed floater, high off the glass.
Williams has been described as the engine that will power the reconfigured Nets this season, but he is still getting revved up. After sitting out during the preseason with the ankle injury, Williams was restricted to playing 25.3 minutes a game over the Nets' first three regular-season games. The plan has been to build up his minutes each game, but his services were not required late Tuesday.
Before the game, Coach Jason Kidd said Williams's slow start was expected, given his inactivity last month.
'For Deron, this is preseason, training camp,' Kidd said.
Williams averaged 8 points and 8 assists through the first three games - shooting just 36.0 percent from the field - and acknowledged that it would take some time to catch up to his teammates.
'I just think it's a matter of getting my legs under me,' Williams said before the game.
He went 4 for 6 from the field, and was in the middle of everything positive early on. It was encouraging stuff from Williams, who, while working to regain his old form and confidence, was also trying to improve upon a personal 0-4 record against the Jazz, the team that drafted him eight years ago.
The Jazz, to be fair, did not provide too stern a test. The young group was way off the mark, going 13 for 37 from the field in the first half.
Gordon Hayward led them, finishing with 22 points, 5 rebounds and 4 assists. Derrick Favors, who was midway through his rookie season when the Nets traded him to the Jazz to acquire Williams, entered the game averaging 13.7 points and 10.7 rebounds. But he was quiet against his old team, being held to 6 points and 5 rebounds.
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