NEW YORK — The Brooklyn Nets are stuck in a rut right now as it seems that nothing is working from them, even when it should. Nets head coach Jacque Vaughn has been transparent about why Brooklyn has lost so much lately, but it seems that he found another reason for yet another loss.
“I think if I could pinpoint to one thing, every time we didn’t come away with a 50/50 ball, we paid for it,” Vaughn said after Monday’s 96-95 overtime loss to the Miami Heat. The Nets led by as many as 16 points in the third quarter, but the Heat used a 19-5 run from the beginning of the period to tie the game at 50 with 5:19 left. Part of the reason was the change in effort from both teams.
“For example, the one at the end, probably 40 seconds to go, there’s a loose ball and (Tyler) Herro ends up shooting a three,” Vaughn explained. In the play in question, Vaughn is referring to a play with less than a minute to go in overtime when a pass from Herro to Bam Adebayo was not caught cleanly and Herro was able to get an open look from three because Adebayo was able to beat Nic Claxton to it.
From the beginning of the second half, it looked like the Heat were quicker to the basketball on almost every 50/50 play despite playing on the second leg of a back-to-back. It looks like the Nets have to figure how to put together a full game of playing the way that they did in the first half.
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