It wasn’t pretty and it wasn’t easy. But it was enough.

The Nets ground out a 120-116 escape against Atlanta before a sellout crowd of 18,072 at Barclays Center on Friday.

It capped a 6-1 homestand and moved Brooklyn (15-12) into fourth place in the Eastern Conference, a half-game ahead of Indiana, where the Nets will play Saturday.

“We out-rebounded somebody! We’re going to lead with that,” coach Jacque Vaughn said. “We showed that to the team after. Some big, big possessions and winning plays. And that’s what it boiled down to.

“Whatever it’s gonna take to win. Whether it’s different rotations, somebody’s in or out, all the above. We’re getting to a place where you’re just doing your role in order to help us win.”

In order to win they had to survive 33 points from Trae Young and another 31 from Bogdan Bogdanovic. But the Nets’ stars were just as dominant, and they made winning plays and got huge rebounds down the stretch.

Kevin Durant poured in 34 points, while Kyrie Irving added 33 and a season-high 11 rebounds. Though Durant was brilliant early (18 in the first quarter), it was his plays late in the endgame that decided it.

“Just doing whatever it takes to win,” Irving said. “Just laying it out there and again just sacrificing your body for the greater good of the team. Royce [O’Neale] had some incredible offensive rebounds and tip-outs and usually our defensive principle is to get back but I’m glad he did it. We were all crashing the boards, it could have cost us but we got rewarded for it.”

The Nets trailed 109-108 after a Young step back. But Durant hit a go-ahead 3-pointer, then — after a Young miss — found Joe Harris for an acrobatic baseline layup and 113-109 edge with just under three minutes to play.

Then Durant hit a 3-pointer off a Seth Curry kick out that provided the dagger. It gave the Nets a 116-111 lead with 1:09 left, and they closed it out at the charity stripe.

“We saw Royce get three or four offensive rebounds during that quarter that was just huge. Kyrie had two that were just huge. How many did we end up with, nine? We don’t do that,” Durant admitted. “But they went in there and put their nose in there and got some rebounds for us and created some extra possessions for us, which was key and the reason why we got those 3s late.”

The Nets played without starting center Nic Claxton and missed his defense, allowing 50.5 percent shooting. But they actually out-rebounded Atlanta, 39-36. When the Nets are within two rebounds of their foes, they’re 10-1.

They’re comfortable in nail-biters, now 7-2 in single-digit games since Vaughn took over as the head coach on Nov. 1.

Clinging to a 47-45 edge after a Bogdanovic floater with 7:43 left in the half, Irving went on a one-minute one-man blitz. He personally ran off eight unanswered points, capped by a pull-up 3 to give the Nets a 55-45 lead.

T.J. Warren — playing with Ben Simmons for the first time — padded the cushion to 59-47 with 5:02 in the half.

It was down to four at the break — despite a first half that saw the Nets shooting a white-hot 65.9 percent — and still 76-72 after Young’s driving floater with 8:49 remaining in the third quarter.

Consecutive 3-pointers by Harris and Irving pushed it to double digits, and another by O’Neale padded it back up to a dozen again at 85-73 with 7:28 in the third.

Brooklyn coughed up 11 unanswered points, and the lead.

After Warren’s 3 put the Nets up 96-88 with just 40.6 seconds left in the third, they surrendered a run that spanned into the fourth. Bogdanovic’s back-to-back buckets put Atlanta ahead, and Jarrett Culver’s free throws left Brooklyn in a 99-96 hole with 8:53 to play.

Down 107-103, an offensive rebound led to a wide-open Curry 3. Then Irving put Trent Forrest on skates for an 18-foot pullup and 108-107 edge with 4:38 left.

They fell behind 109-108 on that Young step back, before Durant took over.