AUBURN HILLS – The Nets have played elimination games before. They have swept teams, they have been swept. They’ve overcome deficits, they’ve blown leads. They’ve been to the NBA Finals twice.
But this core group never has played a seventh game. Until tonight.
The Nets are aware of the magnitude of the game against the Pistons at the Palace. Win and advance to face Indiana, keeping alive the hope of an NBA title. Lose and the two-year reign as Eastern Conference champions ends.
“We’ve got every thought that we’re going to win this game. Why would you feel any other way? There’s no questions, no fear, no doubt,” said Kenyon Martin, displaying the confidence the Nets have for the first NBA Game 7 in the history of the franchise.
As much as the Nets like their chances, the Pistons feel the same. History says 83 percent of home teams win Game 7.
“I love the odds, but we still have to play,” Piston Richard Hamilton said. “We don’t think about losing. Any great team never thinks about losing.”
The Nets, remarkably loose yesterday, recited the standard lines: Bring it all, leave it all. They insisted they will feel no pressure. Butterflies, yes. Pressure no. They approach it as another game. To do otherwise would be to invite that pressure.
“This is not the biggest game I’ve ever played in. It’s not the biggest my teammates have ever played in,” Richard Jefferson said. “It’s a game; if you lose you go home. You’re not going to be too emotional. You just approach it like any other game.”
Yup, like any other game that could end a season in gnawing disappointment. If the Nets win, they head to Indiana for Game 1 of the East Finals on Saturday. If they lose, they start cleaning out their lockers.
“Honestly, you believe you’re going on, going to play the game and then play Indiana,” Game 5 hero Brian Scalabrine said. “I said good-bye to my wife . . . I know I’ll be gone for six days. You don’t think of anything else, not the magnitude of a Game 7. One of these teams is going to go home, but you don’t think of it that way. You look at it as, today might have been our last practice, and all day you’ll be going nuts.”
The game, thus the series, could ride on the play of Jason Kidd, the savior of the Nets franchise who has battled a bruised knee and a sore back but declined to admit to pain, or sidestep responsibility.
“Comes with the territory,” Kidd said of having the burden on his shoulders.
Kidd said he expected the Nets to draw on their experiences in the past, like from Game 5 against Indiana two years ago. Then he gave the team a pump-it-up pregame speech. He won’t do it this time because “This team has been there. This team understands. No one has to say anything.”
The Nets have had a remarkable run for two years and insisted one game cannot undo what they’ve done.
“You have to understand where we’ve come from. There’s no way this franchise can fall back from where we started as a whole,” Kidd said. “Win or lose, we’re going forward.”
Jefferson said, “You don’t build three years of success, put up three division championships, two Eastern titles then say one Game 7 is going to determine it. We’ve got a young group of guys – it’s not the last running of the Bulls. It’s not like Jordan’s 34 and Phil’s ready to retire.
“It’s a game. We’ve played in a lot of playoff games. Been down 2-1, we’ve blown 25-point leads, won triple-overtime, closed out teams on their floor. Look at our resume, of what we’ve done the past three seasons,” he said. “We’ve played elimination games, we played in the Finals. There’s nothing we haven’t done, so we might as well go out and play.”
