Magic 92 – Nets 83
ORLANDO – A 12-point deficit now stood at four and Jason Kidd found himself open for a 3-pointer with the game clock just north of the 2:00 mark. Kidd sized it up and let fly. The shot looked true, went halfway down.
And of course, it came out. It was that type of a night for the Nets.
“We had great looks, wide open looks,” said Richard Jefferson. “You shoot shots and 10 of them roll in and out, there’s nothing you can do about that.”
Except lose, which was the Nets’ fate as they lost their claim to the best record in the East with Indiana’s win.
While some claimed All-Star-break rust and some waved off the notion completely, all were in agreement on one point: you shoot .326 in the NBA and you lose.
And that was the Nets’ fate as they started their post-break run with a clunker, a 92-83 defeat against the Magic, who got 32 points from Tracy McGrady and a great hustle effort by the bench.
“You shoot 32 percent, you’re not going to win a whole lot of games,” said coach Byron Scott, whose Nets (34-16) are back at it tonight in Memphis. “Obviously, we didn’t shoot the ball very well and in the fourth quarter, their bench, their energy guys … built the lead when McGrady was out.”
The Magic (25-26) delivered the turning point after Jefferson (15 points) went into the paint at 10:25 to give the Nets a 65-64 lead. Orlando then ripped off the next 13 points while the Nets were bricking six shots and committing three of their season-low six turnovers.
Not one of those points came by McGrady – but five of them came by Darrell Armstrong, who finished the night with 20. Who did the damage with Armstrong? Household names like Pat Burke and Jacque Vaughn. The streak left the Nets in a 77-65 ditch with 6:26 left.
“You’ve got to make shots and get stops,” said Kidd, who endured a dismal 5-of-21 shooting effort – but contributed 19 points, 8 assists, 8 rebounds and four steals. “We just didn’t make shots when we needed them.”
Or stop the Magic when they had to.
“I told the guys on the bench,” said McGrady, the NBA’s leading scorer, “this is where we have to grow up, mature as a ballclub and learn how to close out games. I told them we’ve got to make stops.”
But the Nets weren’t going away. They retaliated with Kenyon Martin (playing on a tight left knee and with a banged up nose courtesy of a third quarter elbow by Andrew DeClercq) scoring eight of his 17 points in the final 5:26 of the fourth. But it wasn’t enough. Every time the Nets moved in for a kill, something went wrong. Like Kidd missing the 3-pointer.
“It was halfway down and it rattled in and came back out. That was the type of the night I had and the team as a whole we had,” Kidd said.
Even after the Kidd miss there was hope – the rebound went out off Orlando and Kerry Kittles (13 points) wound up hitting two free throws at 1:40 to make it just a two-point game, 83-81. But then Orlando delivered a dagger – a 3-pointer from the corner by Armstrong.
“That hurt,” Martin understated.
Kidd hit two free throws, but then Pat Garrity drove for a three-point play at :44.9 for an 89-83 edge. It was only a six-point different but since the Nets’ last field goal of the game had come at 2:25, there wasn’t a whole heckuva lot of hope.
“We got great looks. We just missed shots. We just couldn’t make a shot tonight, especially when we needed to,” Scott sighed. “The shots that Kerry Kittles (6-of-16) was getting and Lucious Harris (2-of-9) and Jason, I would take those shots every day with those guys shooting the ball. Tonight, they just didn’t fall.”
