With the NBA on hiatus — which NBA commissioner Adam Silver set at 30 days — and New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, placing a ban on gatherings of more than 500 people for the foreseeable future due to the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, no Brooklyn Nets games will be played for the time being.
For the Nets, as much as any team, this comes at an odd time — Brooklyn was battling the Orlando Magic for the seventh spot in the Eastern Conference standings. At the stoppage of play, the Nets had a half-game advantage over the Magic.
Since there aren’t any games, each day Nets Wire will highlight major individual performances and key developments throughout Nets history:
Entering play on April 2, 2006, the New Jersey Nets were the hottest team in the NBA. They were riding an 11-game winning streak, had the third-best record in the Eastern Conference and set to take on the Miami Heat — who also happened to be the No. 2 team in the East.
But overall season records didn’t matter this day, especially not to Vince Carter.
The Nets star went off for 43 points on 16-for-27 shooting. He also had six assists, three rebounds, two steals and a blocked shot in New Jersey’s 90-78 win over the Heat (full box score).
“He’s one of the best, and when you’re one of the best, you get up for games like this,” said Jason Kidd said of Carter after the 2006 win. “When he came here, people talked about how he was soft, how he was a guy who didn’t want to compete when things got tough. But we haven’t seen that. This is just like last year when he carried us on his back in the second half of the season.”
Kidd had nine points, nine assists, seven rebounds and three steals in the win. Richard Jefferson also had seven rebounds and finished second in scoring (16 points) for the Nets. Nenad Krstic scored 11 points and grabbed eight boards.
For the Heat, Dwyane Wade scored 32 points and also finished with six rebounds, five assists and two steals. Shaquille O’Neal finished with 18 points and nine rebounds. Udonis Haslem had 11 boards and Antoine Walker scored 11 points off the bench.