When: 7:00 PM EST; Friday, April 25th, 2014
Where: Barclays Center; Brooklyn, NY
TV: ESPN 2/my9
Game 2 may not have turned out the way the Nets would have wanted it to, as it was a win for the home team Toronto Raptors, but Brooklyn is tied up at one win apiece with the No. 3 seed Raptors as this first round series goes to the Barclays Center for Games 3 and 4. The Nets have the Raptors right where they want them.
Toronto, behind a raucous home crowd that has come out in droves to support its team in the opening games of this series, evened up this first round matchup on Tuesday night with a 100-95 win with the help of 30 points from DeMar Derozan, who returned to form after a 3-for-13 Game 1 shooting performance. Kyle Lowry added a near-triple double and Jonas Valanciunas put up 15 points and 14 rebounds.
The reason the Nets lost, though, was not the 21 Toronto turnovers they forced or Brooklyn’s putrid 29 percent three-point shooting effort. It was their horrid rebounding, as the Raptors outrebounded Brooklyn by a margin of 52-30, which is remarkably one-sided, especially for a playoff game with a lot on the line.
The Nets haven’t rebounded well this season, and were consistently among the worst teams in the NBA in that statistic, but that cannot keep up if they are going to advance on to the second round.
The good news for the Nets is that they are back on their home court for Game 3, which is where they went 28-13 in the 2013-14 campaign, a mark that was 12 games better than their road record.
The Brooklyn crowd at the notoriously intimate Barclays Center will be rocking tonight, and there’s no doubt the Nets will feed off that energy. The young and relatively inexperienced Raptors also could be easily rattled by the first hostile environment they will face in the postseason.
Probable Lineups
TOR- Kyle Lowry (PG), DeMar DeRozan (SG), Terrence Ross (SF), Amir Johnson (PF), Jonas Valanciunas (C)
BKN- Deron Williams (PG), Shaun Livingston (SG), Joe Johnson (SF), Paul Pierce (PF), Kevin Garnett (C)
Final Thoughts
The Nets took homecourt advantage right from the Raptors by winning Game 1, but if Brooklyn loses tonight, Toronto gets it right back. That’s why the Nets need to set the tone early and win this game in front of their home fans in order to take command of this series.
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