Brooklyn Nets, New York Knicks Begin Sprint To Avoid Play-In Games

On Jan. 28 before a nationally televised ABC game in Brooklyn, the question of whether games between the Nets and Knicks were rivalry were asked to be addressed by coaches Jacque Vaughn and Tom Thibodeau.

The unofficial consensus between the coaches was the teams needed to square off in a postseason series for the rivalry to be invoked.

By now, although that topic was discussed fairly extensively less than a month ago, it might as well be a different lifetime or ancient history from the Brooklyn perspective and because of recent transactional events involving star players the rivalry is now jockeying for playoff position in the Eastern Conference with the goal of avoiding below the top-six and being forced into a play-in round.

As of now, the only way the teams could meet in their first playoff series since 2004 would be an unprecedented encounter in the Eastern Conference finals.

The teams will engage in a sprint to the April 10 finish entering the break with both teams entering the “second half” in fifth and sixth respectively. And their paths to their current position are somewhat different.

For the Nets their season can be described in five segments.

The first segment the ill-fated start featuring Steve Nash being fired along with another Kyrie Irving controversy. The second a hot streak of 18 wins in 20 games highlighted by a dynamic 12-game winning that elevated them into the top of the East.

The streak which featured the stars being available was followed Kevin Durant’s knee injury and subsequent trade requests and the actual trades of Irving and Durant. Now the Nets are in the phase of getting early returns from the four players obtained in Mikal Bridges, Spencer Dinwiddie, Dorian Finney-Smith and Cam Johnson.

After all of the events before the break, the Nets come out around the point they were in 2018-2019 with a plucky 42-win team that captivated fans down the stretch as opposed to a star studded team that at times made them more unlikeable.

This time, the key newcomers are the personable Bridges and Dinwiddie, who each some notable moments in the small sample size of the new group before the break.

Bridges went into the break by scoring a dynamic 45 points against the Heat in one of those games where every time he touched the ball it seemed like he was going to score in some form or another. Dinwiddie will the Nets to a win over Chicago in their first game following the trades and then nearly hit a game-winning 3-pointer to force overtime against Philadelphia.

And because of how seamlessly Vaughn is steering the Nets, he was rewarded with a multi-year contract extension during the break. The extension as the Nets approach the three-year anniversary of replacing Kenny Atkinson with Vaughn on an interim basis before they ultimately turned to the novice in Nash.

The Knicks’ path to 33 wins in their first 60 games and a small hold on sixth is more rooted in the streakiness that can prevail. They started with 13 losses in 23 games, then won eight in a row, followed it up with five straight losses, then won seven of eight followed by four straight losses before winning eight of 12.

New York’s recent performances have elevated Jalen Brunson into an elite status and possibly a strong case for the unofficial title of the best NBA player in New York City at the moment. He made a strong case against the Nets Feb. 13 at MSG when he scored 40 points in a game where the guard hit one tough shot after another, enabling the Knicks to pull away and ended a nine-game losing streak in the “rivalry”.

Besides Brunson, there is the rejuvenation of Julius Randle, who endured such a difficult season many wanted him traded as the Knicks went from being the fourth seed to a 37-win team. This time, Randle is performing even better than two seasons ago by averaging a career-high 24.8 points and 10.8 rebounds while shooting 46 percent, slightly up from the 45.6 percent two years ago.

Another positive trait of the Knicks is consistent availability. In this era of “load management” sparking talk about shortening the season from 82 to 72 games, Randle has played every game and Brunson has only missed four games due to minor injuries or illness.

The Knicks and Nets rarely meet in the postseason. A first-round series in the four-five scenario would be electric but now after the teams played a combined 118 games with various events, their rivalry is jockeying for the same goal of trying to avoid the play-in portion of the postseason.