Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving have been other-worldly throughout a historic stretch for the Nets. Brooklyn had won 19 of their last 22 and 12-straight heading into Wednesday's matchup with the Chicago Bulls. Despite their star duo's brilliance, high-level contributions from the supporting cast had put the team over the top during the hot stretch.

Durant’s historic season continued Wednesday, but his role players disappeared and so did Brooklyn’s league-best win streak. The Bulls took down the Nets 121-112 despite 44 points on 15 of 22 shooting from Durant.

Royce O’Neale, Joe Harris, T.J. Warren and Yuta Watanabe combined for three points on 1 of 18 shooting in the loss. The group of wings has been a major positive during Brooklyn’s win streak with each contributing high-level two-way play. O’Neale went scoreless on 0 of 9 shooting from the field and 0 of 8 from three Wednesday. The offseason acquisition had provided a major lift for Brooklyn during December, shooting 47.4 percent from deep on 5.2 attempts per game.

Despite O’Neale’s struggles, head coach Jacque Vaughn chose to leave him in the game down the stretch, something Chicago took advantage of by doubling Durant and Irving. O’Neale failed to convert on two wide-open threes in the final minutes, but Vaughn stuck by his decision to roll with the wing postgame.

“I have an extreme amount of confidence in him to play him 35 minutes. He missed his first shot, missed his second shot, but we’re going to continue to have confidence in him,” the head coach said. “I love coaching Royce. And he’ll continue to be out there, and he’ll get those shots and he’ll make them.”

Ben Simmons also struggled during the loss, scoring seven points on five shot attempts with just two assists to four turnovers. Seth Curry, who has seen his minutes cut during Brooklyn’s extended hot steak, was the only role player to show up for Brooklyn. The sharpshooter kept the Nets in the game down the stretch, draining 6 of 7 three-point attempts on his way to 22 points for the night.

Kyrie Irving contributed 25 points on 10 of 24 shooting. After shooting 28 of 53 (52.8 percent) from three over his last six games, Irving struggled to find his stroke Wednesday, converting on 1 of 8 attempts. The Nets were 1 of 20 from deep outside of Durant and Curry.

“Obviously, Kevin is being special, but he can only do so much on his own. And we’ve been talking about it during the win streak just helping him out. Tonight was one of those nights where we just didn’t make enough shots on the perimeter,” Irving said.

“I felt like Chicago made it pretty easy for us to get some open looks. I think I heard Billy (Donovan) saying not too long ago that they were living with other guys shooting three-pointers as long as me and Kevin didn’t get it. We just don’t lose confidence in our shooters and our ability to make plays. We’ll take this one on the chin like men and get ready for the next two games on this road trip.”

Brooklyn allowed Chicago to score 40 points on 17 of 23 shooting in the first quarter. The Nets cut the deficit to three at multiple points in the second half but could not dig themselves out of the early hole given their struggles from three. Despite their shooting woes, Vaughn said he was happy with the quality of looks his team generated in the loss.

“That’s part of basketball,” Vaughn said. “That’s what I told the group… the great thing about this game.”

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“We have shown how to respond after a win, and we just kept winning. Now how do we respond after a loss? That’s why you don’t get too high or too low in this thing. You just get ready to play the next game.”

The loss is Brooklyn’s first since Dec. 4th. After a 5-9 start, the Nets boast the second-best record in the league following the recent hot stretch, just one game behind the Boston Celtics for first place in the Eastern Conference.

Brooklyn will look to bounce back as they continue a three-game road trip with stops in New Orleans and Miami later this week.