Monday night against the Dallas Mavericks, the Brooklyn Nets went to extremes in shaking off a month's worth of offensive doldrums.
In their 127-88 win, the Nets posted their largest margin of victory this season, took their biggest in-game lead of the year with a 44-point fourth-quarter bulge, and shot their second-highest field goal percentage of the year in making 48 of 85 shots (56.5 percent).
How much of the offensive explosion had to do with changes to the starting lineup and rotations vs. a simple overdue breakout? That remains to be seen. But the first glance was pretty good.
With Treveon Graham out with back soreness — Graham is listed as doubtful for Wednesday night's game against Cleveland — rookie Rodions Kurucs moved back into the starting lineup, this time at the power forward spot rather than a wing role. In addition, Allen Crabbe moved into the starting lineup in place of Caris LeVert.
Nets coach Kenny Atkinson was looking to flood the starting lineup with shooting threats, and Kurucs, Crabbe and Joe Harris combined to make eight threes — five from Kurucs. Meanwhile, LeVert and Dinwiddie combined to present a dual downhill threat.
As Atkinson said after the win, it's just one game. But he's looking for stability, not a constant shuffle.
"Listen, the one thing I don’t want to do is jump around," said Atkinson. "That’s my fear of going back, but I do think we were kind of at that point after three losses in a row and we felt like we didn’t really play that well, either, that we needed to do something and that’s what we came up with. Listen, I would love to stick with what we’re doing but there’s no guarantee. I think, like I said, we’re re-integrating these guys coming back from injury, it’s a little bit of a trial and error, just how it is."
DRIVE GAME
Going into Monday night's game against Dallas, Kenny Atkinson felt Brooklyn's drive game had fallen off a bit. Third in the NBA overall with 52.7 drives per game this season, the Nets' number had dropped to 47.8 over the previous 15 games.
In pairing LeVert and Dinwiddie with the second unit Monday night and having them play together for 15 minutes, Atkinson put together a pair of rangy rim attackers. LeVert went for 18 points while scoring four times in the paint and getting to the line for eight free throws, while Dinwiddie had 16, getting four of his six field goals off drives. They also had five assists each.
The Nets drove it 51 times overall, closer to their season average.
"Better than in previous games," said Atkinson. "I think we can take it to another level. I still think we're being a little timid driving it to the rim. I'd love to see more free throw attempts. I'd love to see more rim attempts. It was OK, but I think we can do better."
D'ANGELO'S DIMES
D'Angelo Russell is up to 12th in the NBA in assists with 6.8 per game. He had 11 against Dallas on Monday night and the last time he had fewer than six in a game was Feb. 4 vs. Milwaukee. In the 11 games since, he's averaging 8.8 per game.
"He's a master at reading defenses," said Kenny Atkinson after the win over Dallas. "They're a heavy shift team; in the pick and roll they come over strong. He's so good at finding those weak-side guys and throwing bullets without a lot of motion. It's really a knack he has. I thought that opened up our 3-point shooting."
CARLISLE ON KENNY
Rick Carlisle coached the Dallas Mavericks to an NBA championship in 2011. He won division titles with the Detroit Pistons and Indiana Pacers, was named NBA Coach of the Year in Detroit in 2002 and led Indiana to the league's best record in 2004.
Carlisle has a Hall of Fame-type resume, and Monday night he joined the chorus of coaches around the league who have praised the work Kenny Atkinson has done in Brooklyn.
"He’s one of the most respected coaches in our business because of the task he undertook a few years ago, which was a culture change and a reinvention," said Carlisle. "Taking a lot of players that were pushed aside by other teams, you look what they’ve done here with (Spencer) Dinwiddie and (Caris) LeVert. Those guys had injuries histories. They’ve gotten them healthy, and they’ve turned them into high-level players.
"You can go right on down the line. Joe Harris was another guy who was a little banged up after the draft. A lot of people thought he would be a depth player in this league, probably not a rotation player. Now, he’s a starter, and he’d be a player that most teams would covet because he is so solid at both ends of the floor. There’s a bunch of guys they’ve got like that. He’s done tremendous work here. He never changes his approach. He’s always positive. His sideline demeanor is energetic and reinforcing of the effort of the players. They’ve got a really valuable piece of the puzzle in him."
ABOUT THE CAVALIERS
The Cavaliers have had extensive roster turnover throughout the season, most recently adding former Net Nik Stauskas and along the way trading away George Hill, Rodney Hood and Kyle Korver. Korver was traded for some draft picks plus Alec Burks, who was around long enough to burn Brooklyn with a game-winner on Dec. 3 before being dealt in a Feb. 7 three-team trade. Kevin Love has played just 11 games due to a toe injury; he returned Feb. 8 and leads Cleveland with 18.4 points and 11.0 rebounds. The Cavs are 26th in offensive rating (106.0) and 30th in defensive rating (116.1). They're 16-48 and 14th in the Eastern Conference.