Entering Game 3 behind a 2-0 first-round series against the Celtics, the Nets have been rocked by Boston’s physicality. They’ve faced driving lanes so clogged that they likened it to playing bumper cars, and it gave them paralysis by analysis.
The Nets know that when they take the floor Saturday night at Barclays Center, essentially a must-win playoff game at home, they can’t just sit idly by and watch Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving battle it out while being overrun. .
They have to play faster and freer. Or, as Andre Drummond put it, F-it.
“We have a new team here. We have guys who have been part of teams where they have been very, very successful and who are still trying to figure each other out with little time,” Drummond said. “There’s a lot of questions when it comes to making certain plays, like, ‘Should I make this play or should I not make this play?’
“We need to have an F-it mentality and just play. Just play regardless of physicality. Just play our game and don’t think about it too much and just play the best you can. We have a very special team here, and we could do something special.”
But knowing that no team in the NBA has ever come back from a 3-0 series deficit, doing something special this season almost certainly requires victory on Saturday.
That likely means not letting Boston hit them first, literally and figuratively.
The Celtics not only manhandled the Nets and exploited their actions before they had a chance to execute them, they also baffled them in the third quarters of Games 1 and 2.
“For us, just going out with the energy, getting the hit first. We let them bat first in those third quarters,” Drummond said. “We have to keep up the energy, resist the races… and come out on top. It’s as simple as that.”
If the Nets were surprised by Boston’s physicality, the Celtics say that was the plan.
“I hope so. That’s what the playoffs are all about, being physical,” Marcus Smart said.
Durant’s consecutive games shooting below 40 percent with more than six turnovers were the first of his career. And it’s largely because the Celtics have generally kept him from getting to the basket or the paint and made him work when he got there.
After Durant made 36.5 percent of his shots in the paint this season, just 12 percent of his shots went there in the first two games this season, according to league stats.
Before Saturday, the supporting cast has to lift Durant and Irving, the stars who previously carried them.
“We need to help them as much as possible. It’s not just about those two guys, it’s a team sport, so everyone has to contribute,” said Goran Dragic. “Most of the time those two guys are going to have the ball, and our job is to open up the floor for them, set up good screens and give them space so they can operate it. Our offense is a little [stagnant] sometimes. When we play fast and with a motor, it’s much better”.
Boston’s switchups and the Nets’ poor ball movement forced Durant to isolate and hit the ball. He took more than two dribbles on just 40.7 percent of his attempts this season, shooting 50 percent when he took three to six dribbles and 45.7 percent when he took more than seven.
But in this series? He has been forced to take more than two dribbles on 53.7 per cent of his attempts, hitting just 27.3 per cent after three to six dribbles and 18.2 per cent after seven or more.
“When we go up against the half-court defense, yes, we have to move. It’s like crashing cars. We can’t get the ball to KD and Ky, and all four guys stand there,” Dragic said. “They can clog the paint, help each other, put two or three guys, and it is not easy to operate.
“We have to be on the same page, move around a lot. When you run towards the screen, run with rhythm, establish a screen and then it’s not over. Then you have to roll to the basket, collapse the defense, force the rotation. And from there, hopefully, it opens up, and we know what those two guys can do when they have room.”
Reference-nypost.com