After going a combined 41-123 over the last two seasons, including an NBA-worst 20-62 a season ago, the Nets insist their renewed resolve under second-year head coach Kenny Atkinson and general manager Sean Marks will provide better results.

“Realistic expectations are to try to be better than we were last year,” said Carroll, who came to Brooklyn with a pair of draft picks in July for Justin Hamilton.

“If it’s 10 or 15 games, if we slip in the playoffs, or if we don’t, it’s being better,” he added. “Then, next year, you start trying to creep and do whatever you can to get into the playoffs.”

Creeping up on the competition is something the Nets didn’t have to worry about during their first three seasons in our fair borough.

Brooklyn qualified for the postseason in each of those campaigns, going as far as the Eastern Conference semifinals in 2013-14.

But that team, featuring five All-Stars in Joe Johnson, Brook Lopez, Deron Williams, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce, is a distant memory for Brooklyn fans who have endured the worst back-to-back campaigns in franchise history.

Point guard Jeremy Lin, who spent a good portion of his first season here watching from the bench due to injury as his teammates got humbled night after night, believes there is room for the Nets to climb into the Eastern Conference playoff picture.

Last season, the Chicago Bulls grabbed the eighth and final postseason spot in the East with a 41-41 record, and only the top four seeds in the conference were better than four games above .500.

While breaking even one season after finishing 42 games below .500 might be viewed as a stretch for even the most ardent Nets supporter, Lin sees a path to Brooklyn forging its way back into the postseason conversation.

“I think if we were to sneak into the playoffs, that would be a surprise or a shock and a lot of things would have to go our way,” Lin admitted. “But a lot of things had to go my way for me to get here. So, I’m definitely up for the challenge.”

Challenging one another is the best the Nets can do for now as their first preseason game tips off next Tuesday at Madison Square Garden against the arch rival Knicks, and their regular season opener, Oct. 18 at Indiana, is still several weeks off.

Russell, acquired from the Los Angeles Lakers this summer along with center Timofey Mozgov for all-time Net Brook Lopez, will pair with Lin in the Brooklyn backcourt, and try to lead this rebuilt unit back into the conference’s top eight.

“D’Angelo knows the expectations of him,” noted Marks, who hasn’t shied away from the details of Russell’s departure from La-La Land.

Russell had well-chronicled beefs with teammates in the Los Angeles locker room, and even got a kick in the rear on the way out of the organization from team president and Lakers icon Magic Johnson regarding his lack of leadership skills.

“He has a chip on his shoulder,” Marks added of Russell, who at 21 is coming off his second and best NBA campaign, averaging 15.6 points and 4.8 assists per contest.

“He knows that defensively he’s got to get better, but he’s got to get better at a lot of different things, his all-around game.”

Carroll and Crabbe are both coming from playoff teams in Toronto and Portland, respectively, hoping to bring some of that winning spirit to a team that has finished with at least 60 losses in consecutive seasons.

“I’ve been here before so I just feel like we should go out and prove people wrong,” insisted Crabbe, whom the Nets acquired from the Blazers for Andrew Nicholson in July, one year after failing to land him via a four-year, $75 million offer sheet, which Portland matched.

“Going into my third year (with Portland), they said we were going to be the second-worst team [in the Western Conference],” he added. “We ended up getting the fifth seed in the West and going into the second round [of the playoffs] against the Warriors.”

Even Mozgov, viewed as nothing more than a salary dump in the Russell-for-Lopez deal, is optimistic as the Nets begin workouts at the military facility.

“We’ve got to start camp, but it feels like we could go to the playoffs,” he said.

Whether the Nets do stun the basketball world and grab one of the East’s eight playoff spots is not as important as Marks and Atkinson seeing vast improvement in Year Two of their collaborative effort to make Brooklyn basketball matter again.

“We have a new group and new guys we have to integrate,” Atkinson said. “I can’t give you all the specific answers right now, but I’m confident with the talent we brought in and that we have left over that you’re going to see some improvement on both ends of the court.”

“Any time you can add talent that’s a bonus, that’s what we’re trying to do,” Marks added. “We’re thrilled. [The new additions to the roster] fit the brand of ball we’re trying to play, but they also fit what we’re trying to do off the court, as well. They’ll hopefully make the Brooklyn brand proud.”

And Brooklynites even prouder to have a team that can seriously compete for something other than averting the NBA basement in 2017-18.

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