CLEVELAND — The Nets had been suffering a crisis of confidence, going down every time they took a punch. But Sunday they finally showed a chin.
Brooklyn got up off the mat and pummeled the Cavaliers 120-101 before a sellout crowd of 19,432 at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse.
It was exactly the kind of game the Nets have been losing. They squandered a double-digit lead and fell behind in the third, but instead of quitting they used a tiebreaking 18-6 blitz to go up by 12, then padded that to 26 in the fourth.
“That’s a physical team and we brought it to them, which is good because we’ve been taking punches,” interim coach Kevin Ollie said. “And for us to throw punches … to have a lead and then they come back in a game, that’s when we usually fade off or get discouraged. But we got encouraged by that. All right, that’s their punch, but what’s our counterpunch?
“I challenged them after one game … who are we gonna be? Forget about Atlanta and chasing all that. Let’s take care of what we need to take care of, and then the results will happen and they’ll fall out in where God intended. But we can’t be focused on something we can’t control. What we can control is us getting better, and we got better [Sunday].”
Much better, outscoring the home team 44-29 in the third — tying their highest-scoring quarter this season.
Cam Thomas had 29 points, but more impressively he was a plus-27 thanks to seven rebounds, five assists and unexpected feisty energy. Mikal Bridges broke out of a funk with 25 points, five boards, five assists and three steals.
“It’s toward the end here. We just have to do it. We can’t keep talking about the effort, energy and stuff. We just have to get out there and do it,” Thomas said. “If we want to get in the play-in, we just have to do it. You can’t just keep getting up here and talking about the energy and effort. We just have to come out every game with the energy and effort knowing what’s at stake.”
Every Nets starter scored in double figures, with multiple rebounds and assists. They shot 53.2 percent overall and a season-high 51.4 percent from deep — including long heat-check bombs from Thomas and Dennis Schroder (17 points, eight assists, two steals) in that explosive third.
“It was great. That means it’s gonna be a great night,” Bridges said of the long 3s from Thomas and Schroder. “This is the basketball gods just blessing [us]; that’s what we were doing. We were playing hard and they reward you.”
The Nets (26-39) didn’t have to face Donovan Mitchell or Evan Mobley — and they won’t much care. They closed within 3 ½ games of Atlanta for the East’s last play-in spot.
The Nets led by as much as 12 in the first half, at 46-34.
A Nic Claxton dunk put Brooklyn up 50-41, but let the Cavs close ghe half on a 10-2 run over the last 3:12. And Brooklyn lost the lead altogether early in the third.
But what made this one different is they actually responded.
Trailing 60-57 after a 3-pointer by Caris LeVert, Brooklyn immediately answered with its own 10-2 run.
And locked in a 67-all tie after LeVert found Isaac Okoro for a 3-pointer, the Nets unleashed an 18-6 run that put the game away.
Bridges got a shooter’s bounce on a 3, and Dorian Finney-Smith followed with one of his own from Thomas on the break. By the time Schroder drained a 40-footer, Brooklyn led 85-73 with 3:22 left in the third.
“I didn’t have nothing to lose,” Schroder said. “I just let it go.”
Thomas followed with a highlight of his own, getting the ball with 4.9 seconds left in the period and pushing it, beating the buzzer with a 37-footer and a 96-80 lead.
The Nets fed off his energy all night.
“For sure. Yeah. Sometimes when teams go on runs we get down, so this game, I just wanted to step out of my comfort zone just to get the team fired up and just lead by example,” Thomas said. “A little bit more talk so we don’t go in another losing hole.”
