Borough battle
rounded game, shoot the three, post-up. Mitchell Robinson is one of the best shot-blockers in the league, very athletic. Taj Gibson has been a great vet for a very long time. Dennis Smith is super-athletic, Allonzo Trier is a great spark off the bench.
“I mean, we don’t know exactly how they’re going to play because it’s only the second game of the season, but if you look down the roster, they have, obviously, adequate talent and have a chance to be, at the very least, solid.”
The Nets have to be more than solid. They’ll need to be sturdy to pull out a win against their rival.
Knicks fans are going to travel, with super fan Anthony Donahue facilitating the purchase of 70 tickets solely for fans in orange and blue. Others not attending as part of Donahue’s group will have no problem hopping on the train downtown to pull for the Knicks on Friday night.
The Nets might be the hot team in town, much like the Clippers have been in Los Angeles. But the Knicks and Lakers have had the stronger fan bases for the entirety of their respective existences.
“This is a Knicks town. We understand that,” said Jordan. “When I was playing for the Clippers we understood it was a Laker town, we got that. But it was also something we were trying to build as an organization and a group of guys. So we weren’t worried about, ‘Oh we gotta beat the Lakers, or we have to beat the Knicks’ for us to have a great season.
“If we’re worried about beating one team, we’re in a bad place.”
For that reason, the Nets viewing the Knicks as just another team — whether true or not — is the best route. The Knicks pose their own set of problems the Nets will have to address.
“Power, strength. I think Randle and Portis, right off the bat, that’s Jarrett Allen and [Taurean Prince]. They’re going to have to withstand,” Atkinson said. “I think there’s a place for DeAndre in this game. I think we’re going to need his force and his size, definitely he’s going to play a big role.”
The home game against the Knicks will be a barometer for the Nets’ fan support this season. Knicks fans will travel, and last season, Barclays Center doubled as a home arena for superstars on visiting teams. The Nets, though, have ostensibly doubled their fan support every season since Atkinson and Sean Marks have taken the helm, and it’s setting the scene for one of the best eras in the history of New York basketball.
“I can’t wait until both teams are playing at a really high level. It’s not a great rivalry without that,” Atkinson said. “You want it Yankees and Mets when both teams were good. You want to see that.”
“I think we’ve seen the shift even in the amount of time that I’ve been here, the fan base has grown every year,” said Harris, one of the longest-tenured Nets. “It seems like there’s more people in Brooklyn that are identifying with the Nets, whereas when I first got here, we were just sort of this transplant team that was sort of picking up different fans here and there.”