Nets playing like completely different team with encouraging signs showing after woeful start
No longer among the laughingstocks of the NBA, the Nets have gone from winless in their first seven games, with just one victory through a dozen games, and 3-16 as recently as just over a week ago, to having won three of four.The reasons aren’t complicated: Michael Porter Jr.has been a force when healthy; their defense, which was abysmal in the early going, has improved; and some of their rookies are starting to contribute.And as they wait to play their next game, Friday at Dallas, the Nets are 4-5 since Nov.
16.While they’re far from a formidable team, they’ve shown some encouraging signs.“You can feel, as a group, we’re getting better,” Porter said following their most recent victory, which came at Barclays Center against New Orleans.“We knew going into the season we had a young group and it was gonna take some time,’’ Porter said of the inexperienced roster after the Nets selected five players in the first round of the NBA draft.“But we’ve done a really good job getting better over the course of the season, and I feel we’re a completely different team right now than we were Games 1 through 7.”Back then, they were routinely giving up 120-plus points per game and seemed well on their way to a historically bad season.But coach Jordi Fernández preached patience, and after getting an undermanned Nets team to a surprising 26 wins last year, he’s begun to get the most out of this year’s team, as well.It helps when the schedule offers up games against a three-win New Orleans team, as well as scuffling Charlotte and Chicago, as has been the case in the three victories, but it beats getting trounced on a regular basis.“It’s never easy to win an NBA game,” Fernandez said.
“This team has played a lot of close games and competed.”That’s resulted in more productive minutes from rookies like Egor Dëmin, who had seven assists against New Orleans, as well as Danny Wolf (seven points, four rebounds and two assists in 19 minutes) and Be...