There must be something in the water over at the Barclays Center as the Brooklyn Nets have joined their temporary co-tenants, the NHL’s New York Islanders, as one of the biggest surprises in sports this winter.
While the Islanders recently overtook first place in the Metropolitan Division, the Nets have completely turned their season around after all seemed lost back in November.
Shortly after the loss of promising young forward Caris LeVert due to a gruesome-looking leg injury that will remarkably not end his season, the Nets nosedived with eight-straight losses to cap off a stretch that saw the team go 12 of 14.
By Dec. 5, the Nets were 8-18 and looked destined for yet another season at the very bottom of the NBA standings, especially with a roster that has seven players 25 years old or younger averaging 20 minutes or more. After all, this was a team that hadn’t won over 28 games since the 2014-15 season.
Whether it was a culture change, a sudden injection of belief, or plain luck, something suddenly clicked for the Nets, who have suddenly become one of the NBA’s hottest teams since that horrific November stretch.
Since that Dec. 5 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Nets have won 17 of their last 22 games, catapulting them from 12th place in the Eastern Conference to sixth.
Much of the credit is owed to head coach Kenny Atkinson, who has taken a roster filled with cast-offs and never-will-be’s and quickly molded them to a postseason contender.
Having built a reputation as a point-guard expert while coaching with the Houston Rockets, New York Knicks, and Atlanta Hawks, Atkinson has helped bring out the best in D’Angelo Russell and Spencer Dinwiddie; a pair of afterthoughts who are suddenly starring in Brooklyn.
Russell, who was shipped away by the Los Angeles Lakers after a failed two-year experiment, is living up to every expectation placed upon him when he was drafted second overall in the 2015 draft.
After averaging 14.6 points and 4.3 assists per game, Russell is garnering All-Star consideration with 19.2 points and 6.4 assists per game in 2018-19. Both figures are on pace to set career highs.
“I would say other coaches just looked at me as just a scorer,” the 22-year-old told Stefan Bondy of the Daily News on Jan. 16. “Kenny kind of gave me the leash, the confidence to do what I do. It sounds so simple but just in general, I feel like I know what he wants out of me versus just playing in an organized pick-up game and I’m trying to control it when there’s no continuity to it.”
Dinwiddie did not have nearly as high expectations as the second-round pick of the Detroit Pistons back in 2014, yet he’s become a vital piece of the Nets’ backcourt. During his first four years in the league with the Pistons and Nets, the 25-year-old averaged 8.9 points and 4.5 assists per game, though he exhibited a noticeable ascension in play during his first campaign in Brooklyn last season.
Still, Dinwiddie is posting 17.0 points and 5.1 assists per game this year that is helping anchor the surprising Nets through the last leg of the so-called first half of the season.
While it’s just a part of a Nets team that has featured the sweet shooting of Joe Harris and the defensive fortitude provided by Jarrett Allen, Russell and Dinwiddie are becoming the faces of a new movement in Brooklyn that is bringing basketball legitimacy back to the Big Apple.
