Nothing easy in the bubble
The Nets’ eight-game regularseason schedule for the return to NBA basketball in the Orlando bubble was released over the weekend. For a team that needs every win it can get to keep its playoff hopes alive, there will be no easy games in the Magic Kingdom.
Here’s a quick refresher for those sleeping in the back of the classroom: 22 teams will play eight games at Walt Disney World Resorts. Only 16 will make the playoffs. The NBA will automatically advance the top seven teams from each conference. If the ninth seed is within four games of the eighth, the two teams will face each other in a play-in tournament that is single-elimination for the ninth seed and double elimination for the eighth.
The Nets stand seventh in the Eastern Conference. They are only a halfgame ahead of the Magic but are six games in front of the ninth-place Wizards.
OK, now that everyone in class is all caught up, let’s pick up where we left off: The Nets also have one of the toughest eight-game schedules of the three East teams fighting for their playoff standing.
The Nets will play the Magic twice, and will also play each of the Wizards, Bucks, Celtics, Kings, Clippers and Trail Blazers once. The Nets went a combined 4-6 in games against these teams before the season was suspended. Even more concerning: They are 0-4 against the Magic and Wizards this season, the very two teams fighting for their playoff spot.
Something else that doesn’t bode well for the Nets: Star power (or lack thereof ). The Nets will have the best player on the floor in only one of their eight games: Against a Kings team they bludgeoned at Barclays Center on Nov. 22, 116-97.
Even that may be a stretch. The Nets, though without Kyrie Irving, Caris LeVert, Wilson Chandler and Rodions Kurucs, played a Kings team short De’Aaron Fox, Marvin Bagley, Bogdan Bogdanovic and Trevor Ariza.
The Nets have one saving grace, and it’s that every team’s schedule is tough.
The NBA invited only teams within 5.5 games of the playoffs to its
Orlando bubble. Every game counts for every team, not just those looking to get into the playoffs, but also those looking to hold onto their current standing. For example, one or two Disney World wins could be the difference between the Mavericks drawing the Clippers in the first round of the playoffs, and the Mavericks drawing the Nuggets.
Nikola Jokic could have lost 200 pounds; Dallas would still rather play his Nuggets in a seven-game series than the Kawhi Leonard-led Clippers.
If the Nets lost all eight games in the Orlando bubble, the Wizards would still need two wins to force a play-in. Again, these are the same Wizards who find themselves with a 24-40 record on the outside of the playoff picture despite employing one of the three best shooting guards in the NBA in Bradley Beal. These are also the same Wizards who beat the Nets twice this season, both with Irving (in the game he sprained his knee) and without.
The Nets may not have a star-studded roster until Irving and Kevin Durant make their grand returns next season, but that doesn’t mean they can’t survive the eight-game slate.
After all, the Nets beat Boston twice this season: Once in a game Spencer Dinwiddie went for 32, next in a game LeVert went for 51. The Nets also walked into the Moda Center and beat the Trail Blazers when Irving went for 33 and Damian Lillard went for 60 but got little help from the rest of his teammates.
Irving isn’t walking through that door. Lillard is.
So is CJ McCollum. And Aaron Gordon. And Kemba Walker, Jayson Tatum, and Jaylen Brown. So is Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton. So are Kawhi Leonard and Paul George. So is Beal, and so is De’Aaron Fox.
For the Nets, everything they’ve done this season in Irving’s absence will be put to the test. They did much of it with Kenny Atkinson as head coach. Atkinson’s not walking through that door, either. Jacque Vaughn had better have a plan.