Kevin Durant has heard what has been said. He knows where the Nets sit in the standings. He understands a lot will be asked of him quickly.
The superstar does not look at himself as a “savior,” he said. But he knows how good he is, and a savior might be required for the sprint to the finish.
“I know what I can do and how much I can help this team and what we’re missing as a group,” Durant said at Thursday morning’s shootaround at the Nets’ practice facility. “But I’m not trying to go out there and win the game by myself.”
Whether he will try to or not, it was all about Durant before he officially returned Thursday night after missing a month and a half of games during which the Nets had catapulted down the Eastern Conference standings.
Durant, who had not played since spraining the MCL in his left knee Jan. 15, said he felt “energized” before the matchup with the first-place Heat at Barclays Center.
When he last played, the Nets sat comfortably in second. Following a 5-16 stretch that included James Harden being dealt, the Nets are in play-in territory and even flirting with missing the entry tournament altogether, entering play just three games ahead of the 11th-place Wizards.
Kevin Durant is making his return to the Nets Thursday night against the Heat. Corey Sipkin“We want to win every game. But we just have to take it a day at a time,” Durant said in his first public comments since Feb. 12. “I know what the standings are. Everybody is telling us every day how far we have dropped and where we may end up — constantly telling us the situation we are in.
“We understand that, and we know that each day is important.”
The 33-year-old and his acting head coach, Jacque Vaughn, were not sure whether there would be a minutes restriction in his first few games. Durant said the flow of the contests would dictate how much he can contribute.
The Nets, who have 18 games left to salvage the season, hope the answer will be: a lot.
“We are cutting it close,” Durant said before he played in his first game in 47 days. “But that’s the situation we are in. That’s the circumstances we are in. We have to go out there and figure it out.”
Figure it out on the fly with Seth Curry, Andre Drummond, Goran Dragic and eventually (they hope) Ben Simmons, none of whom Durant had played with. Durant has been practicing for three-plus weeks and been around the team, but chemistry is a hard thing to develop without games.
The precarious nature of the Nets’ position, the unknowns around both Simmons and Kyrie Irving and the workload that could be quickly demanded were not on Durant’s mind.
He was playing basketball again.
“[There] is just a different feel when you see him on the side bucket getting his work in, how it affects the rest of the group,” Vaughn said. “It will have an immediate impact on our level of juice and our level of play.”
The optimism was not shared by Durant’s first opponent in this final stretch. Erik Spoelstra was flashing back to the 2012 NBA Finals, when his Heat held off the Thunder.
“You can’t game-plan against him,” the Miami head coach said. “There’s nothing you can do that’s going to speed him up, get him out of his rhythm. He’s seen literally every single coverage you can throw at him.”
Durant said he did not want to rush back sooner and play through pain, which could have risked aggravating the injury.
He watched the free fall from the sideline and thinks the team will be better for it.
“It’s only going to build our character as an organization, only going to make us better as individual players and as a team,” Durant said. “So I know a lot of fans watching us have high expectations for us coming into the season and expected us to run away with the championship, but if you’re a fan, you’ll appreciate Nets basketball and what we’re trying to build, then you will follow us along this journey that’s about to come up because you never know what may happen.”
