NEW ORLEANS -- A late turnover and Jrue Holiday's jumper foiled the Brooklyn Nets' bid for a big win in New Orleans as the Pelicans stayed unbeaten with a 117-115 win.
The Nets were up 115-108 at the two-minute mark, but Holiday's jumper with 2.0 seconds remaining capped the Pelicans' comeback. A technical foul after the basket sent Holiday back to the line, where he made the free throw for a two-point lead.
With the game tied at 101 under the five-minute mark, D'Angelo Russell made his sixth 3-pointer of the game and Caris LeVert followed with a 3-point play, cutting to the rim to finish a feed from Jarrett Allen with a dunk and a foul.
Two LeVert drives had the Nets up 115-108 and eyeing a second straight road win before the Pelicans scored the game's final nine points, the last coming after Russell's turnover on a pass intended for LeVert with 7.5 seconds remaining.
Russell led the Nets with 24 points, shooting 6-of-9 from 3-point range and 9-of-16 overall. LeVert was next with 21 and Shabazz Napier had 16 in a big performance off the bench.
An 8-0 burst by New Orleans to start the game had coach Kenny Atkinson calling a Nets timeout less than two minutes in, but the rest of the first half belonged to Brooklyn. They caught the Pelicans at 14 all midway through the quarter and were within 32-30 going into the second.
The Nets shot 7-10 from 3-point range in the second quarter to outscore the Pelicans by 11, go up by as many as 13, and take a 66-57 lead into halftime in their highest scoring first half of the season.
A four-guard lineup early in the quarter included Napier, Spencer Dinwiddie, Allen Crabbe and Joe Harris with Ed Davis, and Dinwiddie knocked down two threes as the Nets went up six.
Meanwhile the Nets were limiting Anthony Davis to 4-of-11 shooting in the first half and his frontcourt partner Mirotic to two points. Holiday did most of New Orleans' first-half damage, shooting 5-of-7 in the first quarter and going into halftime with 16 points.
With the Nets up 52-47, Russell took off on a tear with three 3-pointers and 11 points in the next three minutes. The point guard went into halftime with 18 points on 7-of-9 shooting, including 4-of-4 from 3-point range. With 1:20 to go in the half, LeVert converted a three-point play on a drive to the rim, giving Brooklyn its biggest lead of the half, 66-53.
Another Russell 3-pointer had the Nets up 71-59 in the third before New Orleans rolled off a 12-2 run to get within 73-71 on Payton's three-point play. New Orleans got even for the first time since the opening of the second quarter on E'Twaun Moore's tip in of his own miss that knotted the game at 76.
With the game tied again at 88, Dinwiddie's 3-pointer at the third-quarter buzzer sent the Nets into the fourth with a 91-88 lead.
UP NEXT
The defending champion Golden State Warriors make their only Barclays Center appearance of the season on Sunday. After the Nets visit the Knicks on Monday, they host the unbeaten Detroit Pistons on Wednesday and the Houston Rockets, who were the NBA's winningest team behind MVP James Harden last season, on Friday.