The Brooklyn Nets are headed into the All-Star break as winners of seven of their last 10 games after Wednesday night’s 101-91 win over the Toronto Raptors at Barclays Center.
Four nights after a one-point loss in Toronto, the Nets snapped the 15-game winning streak that had elevated the Raptors to second place in the Eastern Conference. They did it with a standout defensive effort that limited Toronto to 37.8 percent shooting overall and 30.2 percent (13-of-43) from 3-point range.
With the victory, Brooklyn closed the pre-All-Star segment of the season with a 25-28 record and back-to-back wins against two of the top six teams in the Eastern Conference.
“I think I said it before the game, our compete level, our intensity level has to be three levels higher than them to have an opportunity to win the game," said Nets head coach Kenny Atkinson. "I thought our physicality, the things we were missing in the last two games against them, I thought we just raised that. We wanted it bad. The execution wasn’t perfect, but our will to win was at a super-high level. That’s why we came out with the W.”
After the Raptors cut the Nets’ 15-point lead to nine, Caris LeVert answered with two baskets in the lane to put Brooklyn up 95-82 with 3:40 remaining.
LeVert led the Nets with 20 points, plus seven rebounds. Spencer Dinwiddie had 17 points, a team-high nine assists, and six rebounds.
Joe Harris had 19 points and five rebounds, and Jarrett Allen posted a double-double with 10 points and 13 rebounds. Garrett Temple added 10 points and DeAndre Jordan had 10 rebounds.
"Even though our shooting percentage wasn’t great, especially against this team that comes in, they get deflections, they’re active, the fact that we were making that next pass, sometimes we were passing up shots," said Atkinson. "I felt like we passed up a ton of shots, which was OK tonight. We kept making the extra pass. Kept sharing it. That was key. And of course limiting our turnovers. That gave us a much better chance. Our defense, I thought it was elite and our physicality level, our compete level was really high.”
The Nets took a 12-point lead into halftime, picking up offensively in the second quarter after both teams were led by defense in a first quarter that ended with Brooklyn up 23-19.
The Nets opened up the second quarter with a 7-0 run behind a Temple 3-pointer and two LeVert scores in the lane for a 30-19 lead.
The Raptors closed within 36-32 before Brooklyn ran off nine straight points, beginning with Allen’s three-point play. Dinwiddie pulled up on a drive, Taurean Prince made two free throws, and LeVert finished in transition for a 45-32 lead, Brooklyn’s biggest of the first half.
The Nets closed out the first half with six straight points from Harris — three free throws, then a corner three for a 52-40 lead.
Brooklyn led by double figures throughout the third quarter, pushing its lead as high as 15 in the opening minutes of the second half after Allen muscled in a layup and added the free throw for a 59-44 lead. A quarter-ending, buzzer-beater 3-pointer by Pascal Siakam cut the Brooklyn lead to to 75-65 going into the fourth quarter.
Jordan opened the fourth quarter with a three-point play, Temple followed with a baseline drive, and the Nets were quickly back up by 15.
After Toronto cut the lead to 86-76, Dinwiddie scored five straight points, finishing twice in the lane and turning the second into a three-point play and a 91-76 lead that the Nets held with five minutes to go.
"Tonight was really a story about our defense," said Atkinson. "Going into the All-Star break, I know we have 30-something games left, but we’re a top 10 defensive team. Obviously, offensively we have a ways to go. But that’s a nice — you know I said, what was our identity? That looks like our identity right now if you say pick one thing that the Nets are doing well, and I think our defense will probably be top eight after this game. So we have to continue that and then shoot the ball a little better on offense.”