Jacque Vaughn watched Mikal Bridges pull up for a jumper Sunday with the Brooklyn Nets trailing the Philadelphia 76ers by 11 in the final minutes of Game 4. His team was less than two minutes away from being swept in the first round for the second straight year.
The shot came up short. Philadelphia collected the rebound, went the other way, and found Tobias Harris, who drained a wide-open corner three.
The Nets would go on to lose 96-88, despite MVP frontrunner Joel Embiid sitting with a sprained right knee. The sequence was a fitting exclamation point for a Brooklyn team that faced the same reality in all four of their playoff losses:
“The story of this series is we couldn't buy a bucket,” Spencer Dinwiddie said postgame. “We couldn't make shots.”
The Nets shot 33-of-80 (41.2 percent) from the field and 9-of-37 (24.3 percent) from three in their final game of the season.
After leading by eight at halftime, Brooklyn scored 15 third-quarter points to give Philadelphia a three-point cushion from which they would never look back.
The abysmal shooting night caps of a three-game stretch during which Brooklyn shot 40.6 percent from the field and 29.4 percent from three.
Spencer Dinwiddie had his best game of the series with 20 points and six assists on 7-of-13 shooting Sunday. The point guard is the only player on the Nets' roster who can consistently get downhill, something Vaughn said handicaps his team offensively:
“I think for our group going forward, the ability for multiple people to get downhill and get to the paint and create opportunities, that's a need for us,” the coach said. “The first three games with Joel, I think he swayed us away from going to the rim. His ability to be a shot blocker and be a deterrent, and then we weren't able to capitalize when shooting threes. I think if we were able to make some of those threes, maybe we bring him out from the paint and games two and three are different. So perfect storm for them, a learning curve for us.”
Mikal Bridges struggled for the third straight game after a monster performance in Game 1, scoring 17 points on 6-of-18 shooting.
The midseason acquisition shot 21-of-59 (35.6 percent) from the field over Brooklyn's last three losses. The series represented Bridges' first playoff action as a lead-scoring option.
“Just gotta be better. I feel like these past games, I’ve been letting my team down,” he said postgame. “It hurts me. I’m just trying but it’s just a part of it, man. Just gotta own up to it and realize all you can do is just get better. Get ready to get better, that’s the biggest thing for me.”
“I love my guys to death and I told them, that’s on me, I’m sorry I couldn’t come through and just win some games. I just wanted to make some shots but I promised them I’ll be better.”
Despite Bridges' struggles as the series progressed, his performance since coming to the Nets as part of the Kevin Durant megadeal represents the franchise's reason for hope after a tumultuous season.
In 30 games, the former lottery pick averaged 27.7 points on 47/38/88 shooting splits. Bridges said he'll use his struggles against Philadelphia as motivation heading into his first offseason with Brooklyn:
“Obviously I’ll be pissed off and upset about it but life goes on,” he said. “I just got to get better. Get in better shape with being on offense and having the ball a little bit more. Just doing that and guarding the best guys. I'll (use) this offseason to get in even better shape and keep working on my game in all aspects of playmaking, and everything else.
The Nets' lack of offensive production doomed them down the stretch of Games 3 and 4, during which they held Embiid to 34 total points. It was the same story Sunday as Brooklyn limited James Harden to 17 points on 4-of-18 shooting and Tyrese Maxey to 16 on 6-of-20. Tobias Harris was Philadelphia's saving grace as he erupted for a game-high 25 points on 11-of-19 shooting.
Brooklyn's offensive woes through three games were a product of their deficiencies on the other end of the floor. Vaughn's squad struggled to secure defensive rebounds while doubling and rotating off Embiid, something that eliminated their transition game.
The Nets were unable to make significant improvements in that area with Embiid out Sunday as Philadelphia claimed a 25-10 second-chance points advantage.
Brooklyn was outscored 80-22 for the series, one of the largest margins in recent NBA playoff memory and a stat that could bring about changes this offseason:
“We've gotta get bigger over the summer, we've gotta get nastier, we've gotta get guys who really love hitting and take it personal when the other team gets a rebound,” Vaughn said postgame. “That's what we'll be looking for.”
Rebounding will be just one area of focus during an offseason in which the Nets will decide which direction they'll take their new-look roster.
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