Brooklyn Nets: 3 takeaways from a hard-fought loss at Toronto

2. Crabbe not missing a beat

Allen Crabbe was one of the hottest shooters in the NBA at the point he injured his right knee in a road win over the Philadelphia 76ers on Dec. 12.

He had hit 46.5 percent of his attempts from 3-point range in the final 15 games he played before missing nearly two months of action.

After Crabbe had gotten off to a nightmarish start upon his return from a preseason ankle injury, there were legitimate reasons to worry that his return from this injury would put Crabbe back at square one with his shooting.

No worries necessary, apparently.

Crabbe scored 22 points Monday night in the Brooklyn Nets’ 127-125 loss to the Toronto Raptors at Scotiabank Arena, dropping in 14 in the second half and finishing 6-of-10 from 3-point range and 8-of-13 overall in 31 minutes.

Crabbe’s back-to-back 3s in a 48-second span late in the fourth quarter enabled the Nets to rapidly erase what had been an eight-point deficit and tie the game at 120-120 with 1:34 to go.

Since returning to the rotation Wednesday, Crabbe is 12-for-21 (57.1 percent) from deep in three games and his playing time has ramped up rapidly. After playing 13 minutes in his return against the Denver Nuggets, Crabbe played 21 minutes against the Chicago Bulls on Friday and 31 on Monday.

Going back to the last four games before he was injured in December, Crabbe has shot 52.1 percent overall and 56.4 percent on 7.9 attempts per game from deep over his last seven appearances.

He’s averaging 16.6 points, 3.0 rebounds and 1.0 steals in 27.2 minutes per game over that split-up stretch of games.

The Brooklyn Nets couldn’t pull out a win Monday night, but it was not because Crabbe didn’t do his share.