For a brief period on Wednesday night, the Brooklyn Nets looked like the team most people expected them to be this season. And the Nets were not pleased about it.
Brooklyn will look to bounce back from a frustrating defeat on Friday night when they visit the New York Knicks in NBA Cup action.
Both teams had Thursday off after losing at home on Wednesday. The Nets jumped out to a 13-point first-quarter lead before falling to the Boston Celtics 139-114. The Knicks erased a 22-point deficit before Coby White sank three free throws with three seconds left to give the Chicago Bulls a 124-123 victory.
Friday’s game will be the NBA Cup opener for the Nets and the second East Group A game for the Knicks, who defeated the Philadelphia 76ers 111-99 on Tuesday.
The Nets, whose streak of five consecutive playoff appearances ended last spring, seemed poised for another rebuilding project after trading Mikal Bridges to the Knicks on July 6 for a package that included six draft picks and one pick swap. Brooklyn has multiple first-round picks in 2025, 2027, 2028, and 2029.
Despite this, the Nets entered Thursday with a respectable 5-7 record through 12 games, just 1 1/2 games behind the third-place Orlando Magic in the Eastern Conference. However, Wednesday’s loss was the most lopsided and discouraging of the season for the Nets, who led for more than 18 minutes in the first half before being outscored 74-54 in the final two quarters. The defending NBA champion Celtics led by as many as 30 points in the fourth quarter.
Ziaire Williams led the Nets with 23 points against Boston, marking his first time as the team’s leading scorer in a game this season.
The Knicks, a popular pick to contend for the NBA title after adding Bridges and Karl-Anthony Towns to a team that reached the Eastern Conference semifinals last season, are 5-6 through 11 games and have yet to win or lose more than two straight games.
New York appeared headed for a substantial defeat when the Bulls led for more than 34 consecutive minutes between the first and fourth quarters and opened up two 22-point leads in the third quarter. However, the Knicks scored 17 straight points to end the third and mounted an 8-2 run to take a 123-121 lead on Jalen Brunson’s layup with four seconds left.
The potentially seismic win turned into a disappointing loss when Josh Hart fouled White, and Brunson missed a potential game-winning jumper at the buzzer.
