SantaFeToday.com Santa Fe’s Hometown News
By Arnie Leshin
It’s home sweet home for the Nets and Knicks, with the 3 superstar Brooklyn residents at the Barkley Center Tuesday night, and the struggling Manhattan
team at Madison Square Garden Wednesday night.
Except that both are going in opposite directions, and that has nothing to do with the Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges that separate the two arenas.
No, while the 2nd-seeded Nets come away with Sunday night‘s 141-126 domination of the 5th-seeded Celtics up in Boston and are now up 3 games to 1, in quest of a spot in the Eastern Conference semifinals for the first time since 2014, not so for the Knicks after a surprising regular season that brought a 4th seed.
But it also lined them up with a vastly improved 5th seed in the Atlanta Hawks, and has them down three games to one and in danger of having this fine season come to an end.
After the Knicks lost game one at home, they won game two at the Garden, but then lost back-to-back, damaging games at the revitalized State Farm Arena in Atlanta. This time they went down 113-86 on another mediocre performance from leading player Julius Randle, who had been named Comeback Player of the Year in the NBA.
And once again it was point guard, leading Hawks’ scorer Trey Young. He ran the show again, dishing our 12 assists and tossing in 27 points. John Collins added 22, and the new and happier home fans saw them stretching a four-point lead to 88-71 heading into the fourth quarter, and now this franchise can claim its first playoff series since 2016. Meanwhile, a frustrated Randle could account for only 16 points, well below his average.
Such was not the case for the Kevin Duran, Kyree Irving and James Harden trio that tallied 103 of the Nets’ total point. Earlier in what became a 1-point Celtics lead after one quarter to a rout that grew to leads of 30 points, the combo of Durant and former Celtic Irving had 29 of the 33 Brooklyn points, and this was when Harden was taking an early break.
Durant, looking as good as even, turned in 42 points, Irving 39, and Harden 23, with the former Houston Rocket handing out a career-high post season record 18 assists, while Irving brought down 11 rebounds and Duran grabbed 10.
This was with an almost full house at the TD Garden, the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic brought numerous restrictions, but it meant little. They called out nasty things and booed each time former Celtic Irving made a play, and he silenced them by making a load of big ones, tossing in six 3s and constantly driving to the basket past faked-out defenders.
The Nets win another and they advance to the semis versus the 3rd-seeded Milwaukee Bucks, who swept the Miami Heat, who lost in the finals last season to the Los Angeles Lakers. The Knicks lose another and they can only look ahead to improving next year.
The Hawks wrap this one up and they move on against the top-seeded Philadelphia 76ers, who are up 3-0 in the series against the Washington Wizards.
Meanwhile, the Phoenix Suns, with the second-best record in the NBA behind Western Conference rival Utah Jazz, evened up their series at 2-2 by downing the Lakers on the road, 100-92, and with veteran guard Chris Paul coming back from a knee injury to engineer the win.
Now the Suns, who split the first two games in Phoenix, come home again with a chance to take the series lead. Paul scored 18 points and handed out nine assists.
The 3rd-seeded team in the West, the Los Angeles Clippers evened their series against the Dallas Mavericks by winning game four, 106-81,won before another big crowd in Dallas, where they split two games with LA after doing the same at the Clippers.
Kawhi Leonard led the way with 29 point and 10 rebounds and Paul George tossed in 20 as they silenced the Mavs turnout.
