The Nets ’most impressive win of the entire season had come in a Jazz thrashing just after New Year’s Eve. Wednesday’s abbreviated rematch in Utah was so uneven, leaning in another direction.
James Harden’s neck injury left the Big 3 all out of play for the first time and the result was as ugly as expected. The Nets were killed 118-88 by the NBA leader Jazz in front of a crowd of 5,546 sold at the Living Arena.
Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Spencer Dinwiddie, Landry Shamet and Blake Griffin were all already out, and Harden’s loss left Brooklyn decimated. Utah (32-11) did the rest, winning up to 38 points and beating what was left of the Nets.
It was the lowest result of the Nets season, and they became the last team this year to suffer a loss of at least 20.
“Yeah, we didn’t get anything out of it, missing our top three players, missing Blake,” Steve Nash said. “Once the game left early, we were able to rest some of our other types of rotation.
“So we don’t take anything from this game, except for the opportunity for young boys to develop, play and have a chance. So we’re going to move to Detroit and hopefully we have some guys to play with. “
Nash and his Nets had nothing to do with it other than being philosophical, washing them up, and moving on to Friday’s game in Detroit.
With only 10 active players (some of whom were literally just getting to know each other), the Nets shot up just 36.1 percent and 7 of 35 from their 3-point range. They were actually run by newly signed G, Alghero Johnson, who just arrived on Tuesday night and went over a couple of basics on the morning of the game.
The fact that Johnson led the Nets in scoring (23 points) and rebounding (15) was both a testament to him and an indicator of how the night was going.
“Not more [want to] prove to everyone that I belong here in the NBA, I’ve worked hard and will continue to work and be the best player I can be, ”said Johnson, who received advice from Nash and Harden.
“Going out here and playing hard and just having fun. Hearing this from these two guys gives you confidence to go out and play.
Donovan Mitchell scored 27 points in 27 minutes for Utah, who got a 17th straight home win.
“It’s a great team, the team with the best record in the league,” Nash said. “We went out there very weak and, most importantly, we were united, we played a lot, defensively they were pretty good – maybe we left too many 3s, but otherwise we did a lot of good things defensively. I just told them that n ‘ I was proud. ”
The Nets fell behind 16-4 just outside the goal and finished with 21 after a first quarter.
He got out of hand so quickly, Nash gave Joe Harris just 4:57 before deciding to rest him for the end of Friday’s road trip to Detroit. The defeat knocked the Nets two games behind the 76ers for the first in the east.
The Nets (30-15) had punched Utah 130-96 in their Jan. 5 clash, but this time, the Jazz looked like part of the best team in the league.
The Nets had one more League G tone, with debutant Reggie Perry scoring 12 points and eight rebounds in his first NBA appearance since Jan. 31.
“Just dedicate a lot of work all the time to the [G League] all the time after I came back, “Perry said.” It felt good to get into a game and see that the job paid off a little bit, to get a little career. “
Utah’s Georges Niang closed out the first quarter with a 3 to put the Jazz ahead 38-17. Brooklyn forced nine straight failures to get between 40 and 28 in the middle of the second, but an 18-4 run with a Royce O’Neale 3 left them through a 58-32 hole.
The Nets finished 63-38 at halftime, halfway through the season with fewer goals. A 15-2 Jazz run to open the third widened the gap to a 78-40 in a Mitchell 3.