{"id":203375,"date":"2021-03-16T08:53:40","date_gmt":"2021-03-16T05:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/gap-between-knicks-and-nets-still-wide-even-if-score-said-otherwise\/"},"modified":"2021-03-16T08:53:40","modified_gmt":"2021-03-16T05:53:40","slug":"gap-between-knicks-and-nets-still-wide-even-if-score-said-otherwise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/gap-between-knicks-and-nets-still-wide-even-if-score-said-otherwise\/","title":{"rendered":"#Gap between Knicks and Nets still wide even if score said otherwise"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Gap between Knicks and Nets still wide even if score said otherwise<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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The chasm between the teams isn\u2019t always measured simply by the size of the gulf between the numbers on either side of the hyphen. You don\u2019t need a 35-point blowout to confirm what your eyes can see. This is the basic truth of the New York professional basketball season:<\/p>\n

The Nets are a contender for the championship.<\/p>\n

The Knicks are a contender for the play-in round.<\/p>\n

The final spread doesn\u2019t have to be menacing. It wasn\u2019t Monday night at Barclays Center. The Nets won the game<\/a>, 117-112, helped to the finish line by a highly questionable travel<\/a>ing violation against Julius Randle in the dying seconds that replay clearly showed should\u2019ve been a play-on. Kyrie Irving tipped the ball as he was trying to shoot a game-tying 3.<\/p>\n

In a lot of ways, what this game showcased was the worst of the better team and the best of the lesser team. The Nets spent so much of the first three quarters making things look so easy, so effortless \u2014 and yet they couldn\u2019t finish the Knicks off, couldn\u2019t pull away, not until the very end of a one-possession game, not until a friendly whistle carried the day.<\/p>\n

And the Knicks refused to walk away quietly from what could have been \u2014 maybe should have been \u2014 a one-sided thrashing, playing a crushing, suffocating defense late after being lit up early, grimly trimming the lead from 12 to three as the fourth quarter ground on.<\/p>\n

\"Nets\"
Julius Randle and James Harden<\/figcaption>
Charles Wenzelberg\/New York Post<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cOur margin is small,\u201d Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau said. \u201cWe have to play with great intensity for 48 minutes. You let your guard down against that team and they can put points up in a hurry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Said Nets coach Steve Nash: \u201cA win is a win and we did enough to win the game. My only gripe would be we had a chance to be up 20-25 in first half. That can come back to bite you but it didn\u2019t in the end.\u201d<\/p>\n

It almost did. Maybe if the whistle doesn\u2019t blow Randle regathers himself, ties the game, the Knicks ride that into overtime, and Randle doesn\u2019t channel Sonny Corleone at game\u2019s end, furious at the referees. But that\u2019s part of the narrative of these teams, too: maybe the Nets didn\u2019t deserve the win as much as the Nets did. But that isn\u2019t the way justice in the NBA is meted out. Talent rules the day.<\/p>\n

\u201cI liked how we fought.\u201d Thibodeau said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought we could have played much better,\u201d Nash said.<\/p>\n