James Harden returned with a flourish, leading the Brooklyn Nets to a 113-111 win over the Detroit Pistons on Friday night.
Harden had played in 30 straight games since joining the Nets until missing Wednesday’s game in Utah due to neck soreness. Back at it against the Pistons, he scored 17 of his 44 points in the final 13 minutes while racking up his latest double-double with 14 rebounds and eight assists. Harden shot 14-of-30 and made 12-of-14 free throws.
In the stretch that turned a one-point deficit into a 10-point lead at the end of the third quarter and the start of the fourth, Harden scored 12 of Brooklyn’s 15 points and assisted on the other make in that stretch, a Blake Griffin 3-pointer.
The Nets were up 11 when Detroit put together a 12-2 run to cut the lead to 102-101 with 4:50 remaining, and the Pistons evened the game at 106 with 2:19 to go. Harden turned a drive into a three-point play for the lead, and after Mason Plumlee made 1-of-2 free throws for Detroit, Jeff Green’s 3-pointer put the Nets up 112-107 with 58.7 seconds remaining.
“He carried us offensively,” Nets head coach Steve Nash said of Harden. “Made some big plays. We got the win, but we don’t feel great about it. We were up 10 in the fourth and let it slip away and just little details here and there, but James definitely carried us offensively.”
Griffin returned to Detroit with 17 points and DeAndre Jordan had 10 points and nine rebounds. The Nets improved to 31-15 after winning two of three on their road trip and return to Brooklyn to play three home games in four nights, beginning against Minnesota on Monday.
Brooklyn jumped into the lead with an 8-0 run late in the first quarter. With the game tied at 26, Griffin made a pair of free throws, Nic Claxton made 1-of-2, and Griffin connected for a 3-pointer. Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot’s two free throws put the Nets up by eight before they took a 34-27 lead into the second quarter.
Brooklyn led 51-44 late in the second quarter before Luwawu-Cabarrot finished a drive, Harden made two free throws, and Jordan finished a Harden lob for a 57-44 lead, Brooklyn’s largest of the game. Harden scored 12 of the Nets’ final 17 points of the second quarter and had 17 points at the break with the Nets up 59-50.
The Pistons chipped away at the Brooklyn lead throughout the third quarter, eventually pulling ahead 76-75 with 2:04 remaining in the quarter after a 6-0 run. Harden scored the final five points of the quarter for Brooklyn, putting the Nets up 82-78 going into the fourth quarter on a 3-pointer.
Harden kept rolling to open the fourth quarter. After the Pistons evened the game at 82, Harden set up Griffin for an open three beyond the top of the arc, then knocked down a pair of 3-pointers with a technical free throw in between to put the Nets up 92-82 with 9:30 remaining. The Pistons erased that lead, but the Nets held on for the win.
“This wasn’t a great performance,” said Nash. “We won the game. We went 2-1 on the trip, which is all positive, but sloppy. Details weren’t good enough and just felt like Detroit wanted it more than we did too often. This is part of the process, part of the journey to have experiences like this and to learn from them, so hopefully we can. We talked about it for a little it after the game and we can address it at practice and we’re gonna face other teams similar to them coming up who have nothing to lose and are gonna see a target on us and we’ve gotta be prepared to match their energy.”