Dinwiddie backs up claim Nets are top team in N.Y.
Maybe Spencer Dinwiddie was right.
After the point guard insisted his Nets were better than the Knicks, and reiterated that claim this week, Brooklyn closed out the preseason with an authoritative 113-107 win over its rivals at the Garden on Friday night.
The Net got over a hump by snapping a five-game skid against the Knicks. Now — after going into the Garden minus three starters and leading by as many as 21 — the question is can they do this when it counts? Like next Wednesday’s regular-season opener in Detroit? Or their home opener two nights later, against a Knicks team that will actually have provocateur and Netskiller Enes Kanter (who didn’t play Friday)?
“Obviously it’s a good win. But they didn’t have Enes, which is a big part of their team and he really hurt us the first game. So you’ve got to take the good stuff, but also take it with a grain of salt as well, because they’ll be a little bit of a different team when we see them when it’s the second game of the season,” said Dinwiddie, who backed up his talk with a game-high 19 points.
“We were smacking them in the preseason last year, and then they took us behind the woodshed in the regular season. That’s real. That’s how it is. I know the Knicks fans hate me, but it’s not like I’m going to lie to them.”
Dinwiddie will say he wasn’t lying back in August when put some sauce in this rivalry by saying the Knicks weren’t the best team in the city. Or when he reiterated it again in an interview that aired Wednesday on YES Network.
“Do you really think I’m going to sit here and think the Knicks are going to be better than us this year? We had almost the same record last year, and their best player [Kristaps Porzingis] isn’t going to be playing until at least February?” Dinwiddie said in the interview. “This is no shot at the Knicks. I respect everybody in the NBA, so let’s get that straight. Everybody, respect you. I just don’t feel like they’re going to be better than us.”
After folding against the Raptors on Wednesday, the Nets (2-2) bounced back versus the Knicks despite playing sans starters Allen Crabbe, DeMarre Carroll and Rondae Hollis-Jefferson.
“We lost to these guys five times in a row. Nice to be in the other side of it. We know the real deal starts next week so we’re not getting too full of ourselves, but good job closing it out,” Nets coach Kenny Atkinson said. “I told the guys, much better, good bounceback game, we competed defensively, did a pretty good job.
“[I] thought the ball movement was the best of the preseason. Our offense has struggled quite honestly three out of four games. But [Friday] we did a much better job.”
The Nets put eight scorers in double figures, handing out 25 assists. They shot 50.6 percent, and 15-of-37 (40.5 percent) from 3-point range. D’Angelo Russell had eight of his 18 points in the fourth quarter and added seven assists. Joe Harris chipped in 16 points.
“We’ve got multiple guys capable of doing that. The ball just happened to find its way to me,” Russell said of his big fourth quarter. “Everybody had that feel, that bounce in their step. It was easy for me to find guys because guys ran the offense.”
The Nets rolled to a 71-50 cushion after Jarrett Allen hit a left-corner 3 with 7:51 left in the third. They were still leading, 92-75, early in the fourth before coughing up a 19-8 run as the Knicks trimmed the lead to as little as five.