NBA: Nets edge Hawks to push winning streak to 10 games

ATLANTA – The Brooklyn Nets have surged up the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) Eastern Conference standings, and it was largely thanks to the winning mentality in the team, according to Kyrie Irving.

On Wednesday night in Atlanta, the Nets pushed their NBA winning streak to 10 games in dramatic style, rallying in the second half and then hanging on to edge out the Hawks 108-107.

Irving scored 15 of his 28 points in the fourth quarter and Kevin Durant added 26 points, 16 rebounds and eight assists for Brooklyn – whose winning streak is their longest since the 2005-06 season and also in the league this season.

The franchise record is 14, set in 2003-04 and matched in 2005-06.

“For me specifically, when the fourth quarter hits, it’s winning time,” Irving said after the Nets improved to 23-12, just behind the Boston Celtics (25-10).

“That’s all I really know. When I’m out there with that group to start the fourth, I know K.D. is resting a little bit, so I just have to raise my aggression level and raise my efficiency up, and I’m grateful to have the trust of my teammates and coaching staff.”

The game was just one of the close ones around the league on Wednesday, with Zion Williamson pouring in 43 points as the New Orleans Pelicans defeated the Minnesota Timberwolves 119-118 and the Chicago Bulls downing the Milwaukee Bucks 119-113 in overtime.

In Atlanta, the absence of Hawks leading scorer Trae Young, as well as Clint Capela and De’Andre Hunter, did not stop the hosts from taking a 63-56 lead after a first half in which Atlanta made just one turnover to Brooklyn’s eight.

But the Nets clawed their way back in the third and Irving scored eight straight points with a lay-up and two three-pointers to push the Nets’ lead to 93-82 early in the fourth.

He then fed Yuta Watanabe for a floater that gave Brooklyn a 13-point lead with 8min 40sec remaining.

The Hawks, led by Dejounte Murray’s 24 points, responded and tied the score at 104-104 with 1:48 to go.

Durant made a pair of baskets sandwiched around one for Atlanta’s John Collins and the Nets escaped with the win.

“Sounds pretty good,” Durant said of the 10-game streak, noting the struggles the Nets have endured for a couple of years – including this season’s slow start, the sacking of coach Steve Nash and the anti-Semitism row that engulfed Irving.

“It’s good to get some stability and win a few games along the way and have some fun,” he told an on-court television interviewer, noting the depleted Hawks played “faster and harder” without their leader.

“I was glad we were able to play a four-quarter game and understand what we needed to do to get a win.”

Elsewhere, the Heat’s Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo spoiled LeBron James’s latest return to Miami, leading the hosts to a 112-98 victory over the Los Angeles Lakers.

Butler, back after missing one game with a sprained ankle, scored 27 points with five rebounds, four assists and six steals.

Adebayo, sidelined for a game by non-Covid illness, had 23 points and 14 rebounds.

James, who led the Lakers with 27 points, said the discrepancy in shots attempted – Miami’s 92 to the Lakers’ 77 – was a direct result of the Lakers’ 26 turnovers.

“They had 31 points off our turnovers. They had 19 second-chance points off offensive rebounds and that’s pretty much the game right there,” he said.

Things got heated in Detroit, where Orlando’s Moritz Wagner and the Pistons’ Killian Hayes and Hamidou Diallo were all ejected after a shoving match that had both benches worked up in the second quarter of the Pistons’ 121-101 victory over the Magic.

The Pistons were up by nine when the incident was sparked by Magic forward Wagner, who shoved Hayes off the court as he chased a loose ball down the sideline.

Diallo raced in and pushed Wagner from behind, then Hayes hit Wagner in the back of the head, sending him sprawling into the Pistons bench. AFP