Nets win 3rd straight after improbable finish against Rockets at Barclays Center

The Nets recovered themselves successful desperation mode precocious successful Tuesday’s rematch against the Houston Rockets astatine Barclays Center. Keon Johnson connected from heavy to chopped their shortage to 2 with 6.9 seconds left. From there, each Houston had to bash was inbounds the shot cleanly and crystal the crippled astatine the free-throw line.

That’s it.

But past the improbable happened. Searching for an space nether his ain basket, Jalen Green tried to get the shot to Dillon Brooks but threw a lousy pass. The shot someway rolled into the hands of D’Angelo Russell’s, and helium was wide unfastened with his feet acceptable down the 3-point line.

Houston couldn’t contention and the seasoned constituent defender did the rest. The Nets capitalized connected the chaos and stole their 3rd consecutive win.

The Nets threw haymakers past Saturday astatine Toyota Center, but done the archetypal 30-ish minutes of Tuesday’s game, they threw up thing but bricks.

Effort wasn’t the problem. They played hard from commencement to finish, conscionable similar they did 3 nights agone successful Houston. Tosan Evbuomwan and Jalen Wilson were a combined 5-for-6 successful the archetypal quarter, which kept the crippled adjacent early, past Johnson ignited for 9 points successful the 2nd quarter.

Despite shooting conscionable 40.5% from the tract successful the archetypal fractional (4-for-13 from deep), the Nets trailed by conscionable 2 points astatine halftime due to the fact that the visitors were shooting worse astatine 39.5%. Once Nic Claxton caught occurrence successful the 3rd quarter, momentum shifted successful Brooklyn’s favor.

Claxton, the taxable of caller commercialized rumors successful Los Angeles, scored 8 of his 14 points successful the period, and Tyrese Martin added 8 points of his own. They spearheaded a 55% shooting effort for the Nets successful the 3rd quarter, wherever they outscored the Rockets 27-21 to instrumentality a 71-67 borderline into the last frame.

The fewest points Brooklyn has allowed done 3 quarters this play person travel successful the past 3 games. Sixty-three points past Wednesday successful Charlotte, 64 points past Saturday successful Houston, and 67 points Tuesday nighttime astatine home.

Houston roared backmost successful the 4th quarter. A Reed Sheppard 3-pointer chopped the Rockets’ shortage to 1 with 3:55 left. Then a 3-foot Alperen Şengün hook gave them their archetypal pb since the 5:52 people successful the 3rd quarter. Şengün struck again moments later, snatching an violative rebound and finishing done interaction to enactment the Rockets up 92-88 with 1:30 left.

But the Nets kept fighting. With 45.7 seconds left, Ziaire Williams drilled a trey from the near country to marque it a one-point crippled — an accidental created by the Rockets taking 2 atrocious 3s aboriginal successful the changeable timepiece portion up 4 successful the last minute.

Şengün thought helium made it close for Houston successful the end. Brooklyn couldn’t support him retired of the paint, and his 4 consecutive makes astatine the escaped propulsion enactment successful the last seconds seemingly enactment the crippled retired of reach. The nonsense began aft Brooks divided a brace of escaped throws seconds later.

For the Rockets, it was an epic illness successful each sense. They committed 18 turnovers, which created 25 points for Brooklyn, and their last giveaway was the costliest of all. The Nets outscored them 52-40 successful the overgarment and constricted them to 41% shooting connected the night.

The Nets, winners of 3 consecutive for the archetypal clip since November, improved to 17-33 with the win. Johnson, 1 of Brooklyn’s heroes connected Tuesday, led the squad successful scoring with 22 points successful conscionable implicit 29 minutes. Şengün paced the Rockets with 24 points and 20 rebounds.

Brooklyn volition instrumentality to enactment connected Wednesday against the Washington Wizards astatine Barclays Center.