Nets Lose Fourth Straight to Porzingis-less Mavericks
After going into the second half with a lead, the Nets’ woes continue as they fall to the Mavericks 123-111. They have now lost their fourth straight.
Believe it or not Brooklyn actually gave themselves a chance to win against arguably the most surprising team in the league this year in the Dallas Mavericks.
Brooklyn led by 10 at one point in the second quarter, they kept their turnovers down and as usual dominated in the paint. However inconsistency is the one and only reason they lost this game. The first and second half were like night and day.
“Our defense overall was [bad]. We never found a way to stop them,” said Head Coach Kenny Atkinson. “We showed some signs of coming back to life offensively, but kind of ran out of gas there at the end.”
In the first half the Nets shot an impressive 53.5% from the field and 44.4% from three-point range. Not only were they efficient, but they put up 65 points, exceeding their first half average by 10 points. In the second half they shot 39.6% FG and 21.1% 3FG, putting up 46 points, failing to reach their second half average by seven points.
In addition to that they grabbed 25 rebounds in the first half, 19 in the second. Eight made threes in the first half, four in the second.
Dallas on the other hand had opposite good halves. In the first half they shot 46.8% FG and 40% 3FG, putting up 60 points, right around their first half average. In the second half they shot 53.5% FG 52.6% 3FG, totaling 63 points, exceeding their second half average by six points.
They grabbed 19 rebounds in the first half, 27 in the second. Eight made threes in the first half and 10 in the second.
More specifically what Dallas had working in their favor was one thing, Seth Curry. He was big for them as their second leading scorer in a game where Kristaps Porzingis was out with right knee soreness. He went unconscious from three, hitting all five of his attempts. He finished with 25 points, scoring 10 in the first half and 15 in the second.
Although the Nets did the bulk of their scoring in the first half, they did finish with seven players scoring in double digits. So that’s one positive to take away from this game. Dinwiddie led the way for Brooklyn to 19 points and 5 assists.
Luka Doncic led the way for Dallas with 31 points, 13 rebounds and seven assists.
“We played way better defense in the fourth quarter,” said Doncic. “Especially the rebounding. We had to close out on everybody.”
Doncic wasn’t lying; they held the Nets to just 18 points in the fourth quarter. Way below their fourth quarter average.
