Nets stay close, but lose to Atlanta in Game 1 of the playoffs

April 20, 2015 By Rob Abruzzese Brooklyn Daily Eagle

The Brooklyn Nets made it a closer game than most expected, but they ultimately lost 99-92 to the Atlanta Hawks in Game 1 of the seven-game series. AP Photo/John Bazemore

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The Brooklyn Nets dropped Game 1 of their playoff series to the Atlanta Hawks 99-92 in Atlanta Monday night, but they made it closer than anyone expected, cutting down double-digit deficits three times against a team that swept them during the regular season.

“I thought we gave ourselves a great chance to win,” said Joe Johnson. “Coach told us going into the game the thing that’s killed us against this team is turnovers, and it hurt us again tonight. If we take care of the basketball and just stay close and give ourselves a chance down the stretch, we’ll be alright.”

As expected, the 38-win Nets fell behind the 60-win Hawks early and trailed 32-20 after a first quarter where they committed six turnovers, didn’t make one assist and shot 0-for-6 from behind the arc.

The Hawks increased that to a 16-point lead in the second quarter before the Nets cut it down to a 52-45 game and trailed by 10 at the half. The Nets’ momentum carried over into the third quarter when they cut the lead to 57-54, but they shot 1-for-8 and committed three turnovers during a 15-2 run by Atlanta that gave it back its 16-point lead.

The Hawks led by 14 with about nine minutes to play when the Nets made their final stand and cut that to four with 1:33 left to play. Unfortunately, they could not finish as Johnson and Deron Williams missed four three-point attempts in the final 90 seconds.

“As I told the team after the game, if you don’t believe you can play in this series, you should believe it now,” head coach Lionel Hollins said. “We played hard. I had no fault with the effort of our guys. We just have to be smarter and execute better.”

Brook Lopez led the Nets with 17 points, tied with Johnson and had 14 rebounds, but Williams thought they needed to do a better job getting the ball to him as he scored mostly on putbacks and second-chance points.

“We just gotta find some actions that work for [Lopez] because we definitely need to get him the ball,” said Williams, who finished with 13 points and two assists. “That little pocket pass that we were getting [him] the last half of the season is not there against these guys. They’re doing a good job of taking that away.”

The Hawks were able to get their offense off of good ball movement and sharp shooting from Kyle Korver, who led with 21 points and was 5-for-11 from behind the arc. Jeff Teague and DeMarre Carroll each had 17 points apiece and combined to hit three threes.

Turnovers hurt the Nets as they committed 17, which led to 24 points from the Hawks, while Atlanta committed just 14, which led to 13 points. The Nets were also outshot from behind the arc as they hit just 25 percent of their threes (5-for-20) and Atlanta hit 33.3 percent (10-for-30).

The Nets will look to even up the series, and get their first win against Atlanta in what will be their sixth attempt this season, in Game 2 in Atlanta at 7 p.m. on Wednesday night.