When the Nets set out on an 11-day, five-game swing, they likely didn’t set hard and fast benchmarks of success and failure.
But at 0-4 going into Saturday’s last portion in Denver — their worst slump of the entire season, with just five games left until the playoffs start — their grade surely falls in the “F” category so far.
“You never want to lose four games in a row,” Joe Harris said after the Nets’ 113-109 loss to the Mavericks on Thursday night. “You’re trying to have as positive an outlook on what’s happening as possible. That’s the best way to do it. We can literally bitch and complain to each other about a whole bunch of different stuff, but there’s no good that comes out of it. I think for us, hopefully, it will tighten up the group, bring us a little bit closer together.
“When you go through difficult times, that’s when you create this bond you wouldn’t otherwise maybe have. So for us to have this now, yeah, it’s tough and it sucks; but at the same time, we still have five games to get ourselves right. To a man in the locker room, there’s definitely a sense of urgency to go out and get ourselves right against Denver.”
The skid has essentially cost them any real shot at earning the No. 1 seed in the East. But now just a half-game ahead of third-seeded Milwaukee for third — and with the Bucks holding the tiebreaker — the Nets are saying No. 2 would be fine.
But of course, getting healthy and back on track would be even better.
“Well, it would be great. It’d be great to have the two seed, to even climb up to one. I don’t think that it’s more of a priority than us growing,” Steve Nash said. “We obviously are a team that hasn’t had a lot of time together, hasn’t had a lot of time with healthy bodies. We don’t want to just think short-term here.”
Thursday’s starting five of Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Landry Shamet, Harris and Blake Griffin marked the Nets’ team-record 35th different starting lineup of the season, second only to Houston.
Shamet was 0-for-5 after going 1-8 in the last loss in Milwaukee.
Spencer Dinwiddie and Chris Chiozza were out for the Nets.
Dinwiddie continues his rehab from a partially-torn ACL in December, and has made it clear he feels he can come back this season. He posted an Instagram video of himself shooting jumpers, along with the caption, “I wasn’t put here to lie.”
Mike James, currently on his second 10-day contract, will be signed for the rest of the season, according to Eurohoops.net.
Assistant Mike D’Antoni had been on Indiana’s radar before coming to Brooklyn to help his former protégé Nash. Now he’s reportedly a front-runner for the Pacers job should they fire Nate Bjorkgren, according to Bleacher Report.
