On Nov. 17, it will go down as a Nets victory. They hope it will not be remembered months from now as a night in which their legs were the losers.
The Nets, playing their ninth game in 15 days and the second half of a back-to-back, did enough to beat the shorthanded Cavaliers but did not do enough to do so cleanly and thoroughly in a 109-99, bounce-back victory at Barclays Center on Wednesday.
They were up as many as 22 points in the first half and thought they could coast a night after being embarrassed by the Warriors. Instead, Cleveland pieced together a 32-19 third quarter that forced Kevin Durant and James Harden to be on the floor late in the game.
“Second half, we just had a meltdown,” Harden said after scoring 27 points on 6 of 12 shooting, plus another 12 from the line. “Just careless turnovers, miscommunications that led to open shots for them and attacks to the rim.”
Nights in which the Cavaliers are missing standout rookie Evan Mobley (elbow sprain), Collin Sexton (torn meniscus), former Net Jarrett Allen (illness) and Lauri Markkanen (conditioning) should end early. And the Nets (11-5) built a 62-41 lead at halftime behind Durant’s 19 points at the break.
But Cleveland did not go away and leaned upon the guards who could suit up — Ricky Rubio (25 points) and Darius Garland (24) — to force its way back. The lead was cut to seven with 4:43 to play, and Harden and Durant each logged about 37 minutes.
“Just came out sloppy in the third,” coach Steve Nash said. “I don’t think we had the focus or intensity; just let our foot off the gas.”
They reapplied pressure on the pedal, and while Harden and Durant were contributing late, they were not alone.
LaMarcus Aldridge, a night after barely playing against Golden State, went 6 of 9 in the fourth to carry the heaviest load in the final minutes. There were putbacks, there were fadeaways and his patented midrange game on a night he finished with 24 points on 11 of 19 shooting.
It was most the points he’d scored since last Jan. 21 — before his retirement and before his comeback.
“I think every game is a different game,” Nash said a game after he did not feature Aldridge, worried about the Warriors’ small-ball unit. “So tonight he had it going, and we had to keep separation. So, he played a longer stint.”
Patty Mills, too, had to step up and poured in 21 points on 6 of 12 shooting from beyond the arc. Theirs is not a deep team, and eight players had to log more than 17 minutes.
By the end, forgotten was the sizable lead the Nets nearly saw whittled away.
Durant, who rebounded from a rare off night against his former mates from Golden State, led the Nets early and seemed to be toying with the undermanned Cavs.
In the closing seconds of the first, Durant faked his way past Rubio then looped it over 7-foot-5 Tacko Fall’s outstretched — and stretched and stretched and stretched — hands for the final bucket of the quarter, in which he tallied 13 points.
In the second, the Nets had thrived all quarter with a double-digit lead that began shrinking. Cleveland cut it to 11 late in the period with a 3 and then an easy conversion after Blake Griffin threw the ball away and Rubio glided in for a layup. With 2:33 left, the Nets wanted time.
The apparent coaching message: Get the ball to Durant. The Nets cleared out once Durant got the ball at the top of the key, and he banked in a fadeaway with a few Cavs draped on him, sending him to the foul line, which would jump-start an 11-0 run. At that point, it seemed as if the game were over. What followed might be the type of half that the Nets — playing without Kyrie Irving, Joe Harris, Paul Millsap and Nic Claxton — could regret if they enter the postseason beginning to tire.
“We’ll deal with that later,” Harden said.
