After Big 1st Quarter, Nets Blow Big Lead at Home to Blazers
By Jonah Mars
Kevin Garnett and LaMarcus Aldridge
Despite scoring a season high 40 points in the first quarter, the Brooklyn Nets shot under 40% for the game in a loss to the Portland Trail Blazers 108-98 in Brooklyn Monday night. The Nets only scored 58 points in the final 3 quarters. Brooklyn was led by Shaun Livingston’s 23 points. For Portland, LaMarcus Aldridge had 27, while Wes Matthews scored 24, including five 3’s.
The Nets played their best quarter offensively by far at the start of this game. They scored on all but 2 possessions in the quarter, shooting nearly 75% and not turning the ball over once. Still, they played very little defense and only led by 9 after 1. However, once the offense stopped rolling, the defense did not make up for it at all. By the third quarter, Portland took its first lead of the game and Brooklyn was never very close after that.
It is pretty hard to play as badly as the Nets played in the final 3 quarters after looking so good in the first quarter. Their field goal percentage dropped by nearly 40 points to under 37% for the game. They were 3-13 from 3. They had 12 assists total. And all this despite only turning the ball over 7 times and shooting 33-35 from the foul line.
The Nets didn’t make many mistakes in this game with the high free throw percentage and lack of turnovers. Instead, they were just a bad team, which is horrifying to see.
Player grades and notes:
Kevin Garnett: C-
Got off to by far his best start of the season, scoring 12 points on 6-6 shooting in the first 5 minutes of the game. But after that, he was beyond awful. KG shot 2-13 for the rest of the game and couldn’t defend LaMarcus Aldridge. I suppose this was his best overall game as a Net statistically, but this just shows how bad he has been.
Paul Pierce: D+
Pierce looked very old tonight. He shot a horrible 2-12 from the field and 0-5 from 3. The foul line saved him tonight and he ended up scoring 11 points. Paul was not involved with the offense at all and didn’t get many touches.
Joe Johnson: C+
Johnson was better than some of his teammates, but this still was a pretty bad game for him. He wasn’t able to defend Wes Matthews at all in the first quarter and didn’t have his shot going really at all tonight.
Shaun Livingston: A-
Livingston was the one Net who looked good tonight. He finished with 23 points on 8-14 shooting and was 7-7 from the foul line. When Livingston was off the floor, the Nets weren’t able to do anything on offense, proving how valuable Livingston is to this team. If Deron Williams is out for a while, the Nets are in good hands at point guard at least with Shaun.
Andray Blatche: C-
Bad Blatche returned tonight. Horrible defense on LaMarcus Aldridge and more bad shot selection. I wonder how many Portland guys he allowed to get open shots in this game.
Jason Terry: D
Terry has gotten off to a very poor start this season and it continued tonight. Still can’t find his shot at all. He had an open 3 which would have cut Portland’s lead to 7 with 3 minutes remaining, but it wasn’t close. No defense, either.
The Nets are back on the road starting Wednesday when they will visit the Charlotte Bobcats. FRWD will have full coverage of the game.