A win? At home? FOR THE BROOKLYN NETS?!?!?!?!??!?!?! The Nets finally picked up their first home win of the season after beating the Charlotte Hornets on Monday night. Well alright!
The opponent tonight is sliding down the standings. The Chicago Bulls suffered their fourth straight defeat after losing to the Orlando Magic on Monday night.
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Where to follow the game
YES Network on TV. Gotham Sports on streaming. WFAN on radio. Tip after 8 PM.
Injuries
No Cam Thomas, Terrance Mann, or Haywood Highsmith. Nolan Traore remains with Long Island Nets.
No Noa Essengue, Issac Okoro, Kevin Huerter, or Coby White. Zach Collins, Jalen Smith, and Dalen Terry are questionable while Patrick Williams, Julian Phillips, and Lachlan Olbrich are probable.
The game
Danny Wolf, we acknowledge you
MORE DUNKS!
This is the first night of a traveling back-to-back for the Nets. They’re back home tomorrow night so we’ll see how Jordi Fernandez manages minutes tonight.
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During the Bulls’ slump, a lot of their underlying issues have been exposed. Billy Donovan is aware of them as well and has been imploring his group to figure it out:
‘‘At some point individually, you’ve got to shut the water off. There are going to be times where you can’t bring help all the time. Teams see things: ‘Drive right through them, pound the offensive glass, make them play in space, make them guard the ball.’ And we’re going to have to do that better than we are.’’
One area they’re going to have to be better at is preventing shots at the rim. The Bulls allow 34 shots per game inside the restricted area, most in the NBA. They also allow the most points in the paint per game at 56 a night. The Nets will have plenty of opportunities to make their way into the paint and they can leverage those Bulls mistakes into great possessions on offense.
Michael Porter Jr being back is a blessing for the Nets offense. He roasted the Hornets to the tune of 35 points on 13-of-24 shooting with seven made threes. Porter Jr gets his buckets within the flow of the offense, and that ball movement keeps things humming for Brooklyn. It’s part of what’s made this perhaps the best individual season of his career so far, as our own Lucas Kaplan discussed with Erik Slater on Locked on Nets!
Seeing veteran players flourish under a new context is always exciting to watch. As Porter continues to shine, we’ll see how defenses adjust to make things harder for him.
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Speaking of doing more in a new role, Josh Giddey has upped his game even with more ballhandling responsibilities. The scoring is up, but the most impressive thing is he’s cut his turnover rate down compared to last season. At only 23 years old, he still has room to grow and improve as a player. For Bulls fans, they hope he can take another step forward and be someone that can possibly get them back to actual contention one of these days.
Player to watch: Nikola Vučević
The Nets will meet an old nemesis. Vucevic has flustered Brooklyn bigs for close to a decade now, and he’s been a more than respectable three point shooter for two seasons now. For some reason, the Bulls have been linked to Anthony Davis. However, that doesn’t seem like it would work. For now, Vuc will man the middle and hope the Bulls can do enough to be respectable enough to get the home playoff games ownership desperately wants. Will he push them into contention? Nah, but he’ll do his best in the interim.
The Nets bigs will have plenty of work to do tonight. Nic Claxton picked up his fifth double-double of the season with 13/11/6/1/1 in 33 minutes. Clax and Noah Clowney have been a fun one-two punch and tonight will be another chance for them to showcase their budding talents. Chicago has trouble defending the paint and if the Nets are able to get solid looks on the inside, they’ll extend the Bulls’ losing streak.
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From the Vault
Ones in the air for Elden Campbell
More reading: Chicago Sun Times, Blog a Bull, Pippen Ain’t Easy, SB Nation NBA, New York Post, New York Daily News, Clutch Points, Nets Wire, Steve’s Newsletter