Despite a rocky start to the season, the Brooklyn Nets are gaining momentum at the right time with their newfound identity
This year has been a confusing one for the Brooklyn Nets. After last season, when this team surpassed expectations and tremendously overachieved, they had bigger goals coming into the 2019-2020 season, especially after their historic offseason.
However, this year showed many inconsistencies and the lack of an identity. The availability of Kyrie Irving, coupled with countless other injuries, and their shifted focus to the offensive side of the ball as opposed to defense, all played major roles in this mediocre season.
Until now.
In recent weeks Brooklyn has rediscovered their defensive prowess that made them so successful a season ago.
As it stands, the Nets rank seventh in the league with a defensive rating of 107.3. Furthermore, they’re second in defensive rebounding(37.7), fourth in opponents field goal percentage(44.0%), and seventh in opponents 3-point field goal percentage(34.4%).
They finally realized that defense should remain their focus and now their point of emphasis is coming into fruition. Understandably, after acquiring players like Irving, DeAndre Jordan, Garrett Temple, Taurean Prince, and Kevin Durant, Sean Marks and Kenny Atkinson wanted to change their scheme and firmly focus on maximizing their offensive repertoire.
With that being said, it has become apparent that their success is predicated on their ability to stymie their opponents offense with stout defense.
The Nets currently sit as the seventh seed in the Eastern Conference with a 26-29 record. They’ve gone 7-3 in their last 10 games and have held four of their opponents under 100 points in this offensive driven league.
They’ve finally gotten back to their bread and butter, and if this trend continues heading into next season, when stars Irving and KD return, then it’ll only solidify their championship aspirations.
As for this season, Brooklyn has a rather favorable schedule this week. They host the Orlando Magic on Monday, then travel on the road to play the Washington Wizards and Atlanta Hawks. If all goes right the Nets should go 3-0 this week, or at least 2-1, while getting hot at the right time.
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Winning ways seemed to have returned in Brooklyn. Their shift back to defense has provided stability to an organization that was suffering from much turmoil a few weeks ago.
Keep it up Brooklyn.