Nets rally past Rockets, strengthen playoff position
Nets forward Royce O'Neale reacts after sinking a three-point basket in the fourth quarter of an NBA game against the Rockets at Barclays Center on Wednesday. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
The Nets figured it out when they needed to most.
The Nets hit nine three-pointers in the fourth quarter — a franchise record for the final period — to key a 123-114 come-from-behind win over the Houston Rockets Wednesday night at Barclays Center.
The victory, coupled with the Miami Heat’s loss to the Knicks, gives the Nets (41-35) a firmer grip on the sixth and final playoff spot. With six games remaining, the Nets now have a 1 ½ game lead over the seventh-place Heat.
“We just kept confident and kept shooting the ball,” said Cam Johnson, who led the Nets with 31 points including three three-pointers in the fourth quarter.
Mikal Bridges added 27 points for the Nets and Spencer Dinwiddie scored 20 points on 8-for-11 shooting and added 11 assists.
The Nets closed out the game with a 18-4 run to hand the Rockets their seventh straight loss.
“What a difference when the ball goes through the hoop,” Nets coach Jacque Vaughn said. “Those last few minutes of the game we were really good on both ends of the floor. It just shows the growth from a week ago.”
Kevin Porter Jr. scored 31 points to lead the Rockets, who led by five points with a little more than three minutes left.
The Rockets should have been an easy win for the Nets. Not only did they enter the game with the second-worst record in the league, ahead of only the Detroit Pistons, but they had lost six in a row.
What’s more, the Nets had a big-time incentive to just stomp on the Rockets coming out of the gate. Vaughn has said he usually doesn’t look at the standings and other games until he goes home at night, but the Nets had a golden opportunity to put a tighter grip on sixth place.
Instead, the Nets found themselves in an incredibly tight game in the first half as there were 12 lead changes, 10 ties and neither team led by more than five points.
Vaughn said before the game that he had never been around a team that had changed as drastically as this team did at the trading deadline. With four new starters, key players were still getting used to each other.
Now, the team is hoping to build on that fourth quarter and the knowledge that they can come up big when they need to.
Said Johnson: “Six games left in this regular season, this was important for us. It’s about getting hot at the right time.”
Notes and quotes. Bridges wacked his hand while trying to dunk in the second quarter, but said after the game that it was feeling fine. . . . Edmond Sumner was back in the lineup for the Nets Wednesday night. Sumner scored 12 points off the bench in the Nets win in Miami Saturday night, but also suffered a bruised hip that caused him to miss the loss in Orlando on Sunday. Sumner scored three points in 4:16 of action against the Rockets. . . . Vaughn is starting to feel more and more comfortable with giving Day’Ron Sharpe floor time. Said Vaughn: “I think there comes a point in a young guy’s career where you have to take things more seriously, where you have to take this as a job. This is your profession. And while we talk and preach about how this is fun, it’s still a game but at the same time there’s a responsibility that you have and Day’Ron just over time began to grow into his role and understanding how he can impact the team, understanding the work that goes along with that.”
Barbara Barker is an award-winning columnist and features writer in the sports department at Newsday. She has covered sports in New York for more than 20 years.
