Trendon Watford was cleared to play ahead of the Nets’ rematch against the Knicks on Sunday at Madison Square Garden, but Brooklyn was still without a healthy center and Karl-Anthony Towns was back on the court for New York after missing Friday’s interborough clash because of a knee injury.
Towns, 6-11, dominated the undersized Nets as one would expect, finishing with 26 points and six assists in the in the Knicks’ 114-104 win. Brooklyn fell to 5-9 this season after losing at The Garden for the second time in three days.
“He can iso, he can shoot the 3,” Nets head coach Jordi Fernandez said. “So, you know, he’s a good player, and he showed his abilities, but on our end, we are not concerned with that. We’ll play and fight against whoever is in front of us, and whether we have more centers or less centers, we’ll find a way to respond. So once again, proud of the guys. A few things we could have done better, especially on the defensive end, but we’ll watch the film, and then we’ll move on to the next one.”
The Nets played a tight game in the first half, although Cam Thomas cooled off considerably following his 43-point performance in Friday’s 124-122 loss. The Knicks doubled him early and often, which forced others to step up offensively, namely Cam Johnson and Jalen Wilson.
Wilson scored 13 points on 4-of-4 shooting off the bench in the second quarter to help Brooklyn keep pace with the Knicks while Thomas and others were effectively neutralized. It went into the locker room trailing by only three points. After hitting the go-ahead 3-pointer late in fourth quarter on Friday, Jalen Brunson was limited to three points on 0-of-5 shooting in the first half.
The Nets shot 45.5% on two-point attempts in the first half and the Knicks shot 65.2%. Brooklyn shot 44.4% from deep in the first half (8-of-18), which helped keep the game tight. It found great offense when the Knicks would show two defenders Thomas, which created open opportunities for others around the perimeter.
Towns dropped 14 points in the third quarter while the Knicks shot 52.2% from the field and forced six Nets turnovers, which resulted in nine points. They outscored Brooklyn 35-24 in the period and entered the final frame leading 95-81, their largest advantage of the night.
The Nets scored 40 points in the fourth quarter on Friday, but there was no such rally for Fernandez’s team on Sunday. Brooklyn was limited to just 33.3% shooting in the final frame and went 5-of-13 from deep.
“That was just the flow of the game,” Johnson said. “Towns got going for a second, they started hitting some shots, and we kind of hit a lull and they were able to separate. That’s kind of the difference in the game right there. We were able to cut it down, had a couple opportunities to get it to six points, eight points, seven points, whatever it may be. We just couldn’t shrink that gap, you know? Closed the third, early fourth and it’s a game of runs. Some of them just didn’t go our way today.”
Johnson finished with a team-high 22 points for the Nets in the loss. Thomas was held to 16 points on 4-of-11 shooting and Wilson finished with 15 points off the bench. Brooklyn was outscored 50-24 in the paint.
“Definitely a problem, but I just don’t think we brought energy tonight… We didn’t play how we needed to play,” Ben Simmons said when asked about the Nets’ paint woes.
Watford, in his season debut, had four points, three rebounds and three assists in 14 minutes. The Nets will return to action on Tuesday against the Charlotte Hornets at Barclays Center.
“I was a little tired, I’m not going to lie, but it felt good though,” Watford said. “I just knew when I was coming in and how long I was going to play. Three-minute stints, four-minute stints, so it was easy just to play hard, try not to think as much and just play.”
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