Wednesday started with what looked like a Brooklyn blowout. It ended with Devonte’ Graham’s brilliance.
The Nets wasted a huge lead — or, rather, saw Graham snatch it away from them. They got lulled into a false sense of complacency, then Graham went in for the kill, leading the Hornets to a 113-108 come-from-behind win before 15,631 stunned fans at Barclays Center.
“For some reason we just weren’t in sync,” Kenny Atkinson coach. “It’s hard to figure out. … It wasn’t that we’d been playing every other day, we had two days in between. I thought we were going to be a little fresher, physically a little better.
“But we got lulled into thinking it was going to be an easy game, psychologically, and it’s just not that way in the NBA.”
Atkinson’s team was reminded just how an easy game can get tough — and get away.
After the Nets (13-11) had won the previous two meetings between the teams, they looked set to take this one when they rolled to a 20-point lead. But Graham had other ideas, pouring in a game-high 40 points — including 13 in the final seven minutes.
“Once we got the big lead we didn’t do a good enough job putting our foot on their necks. We got a little complacent, and obviously you know the story,” said Spencer Dinwiddie, who had a team-high 24 points, six assists and five rebounds.
“You never want to play down to your competition. You never want to have a situation where you have a 20-point lead and lose the game, especially not in that fashion.”
It happened in vexing fashion.
The Nets had been 9-3 since losing Kyrie Irving to a shoulder impingement, and looked set to make it 10 of 13. They ran out to a 52-32 edge behind Dinwiddie and center Jarrett Allen (21 points, 10 rebounds).
But naturally, this being the NBA, things didn’t come that easy. Cruising along with an 82-67 lead after Iman Shumpert’s 3-pointer with 4:10 to play in the third, the Nets seemingly thought the game was over. Charlotte (11-16) reminded them it wasn’t.
“I think so. In the NBA if you get a team twice like we did, you think it’s going to be an easy night,” said Allen, who had just five points and three boards in the second half. “At the end of the day, it’s the NBA and every team comes out to play to win.”
With that 15-point lead, the Nets were stymied by Charlotte’s zone. They allowed a 14-2 run and went 0-for-7 with a turnover, with Graham’s left-wing 3-pointer cutting their lead to 84-81.
PJ Washington’s basket pulled Charlotte within 91-90 with eight minutes to play, and Graham’s 3 finally gave the Hornets the lead with 6:53 remaining.
Brooklyn took it right back when Dinwiddie answered with a 3-pointer of his own. The stretch run was predictably back-and-forth.
Down 99-96, Dinwiddie’s three-point play tied it. But Graham’s 3-pointer untied it, and the Hornets took a 106-101 lead on Terry Rozier’s basket. The Nets never retook the lead.
Brooklyn tried to battle back after Joe Harris — 0-for-7 from 3-point range to that point — finally hit from deep. Dinwiddie followed with a driving layup to pull the Nets even with just over a minute to play.
But Graham responded by drilling a long jumper from inside the arc. And after Dinwiddie missed with 45 seconds to play, Graham hit from deep to put Brooklyn in a five-point hole, and break the Nets’ collective backs.
The clock showed 22.7 seconds remaining, but the game was essentially over.
“He looked like Steph Curry out there,” Washington said of Graham.
“Devonte’ [Graham], in three games we haven’t figured out how to stop him,” Atkinson said. “So we better go back to the drawing board.”