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CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Improvement is nice, but victory is better.
Tuesday the Nets finally got both.
The Nets snapped a four-game losing skid, bouncing back with a much-needed 132-121 win at the Spectrum Center. And Kyrie Irving led them to a rout that was both vital and more commanding than it sounds.
“We just gotta win by any means necessary,” Andre Drummond said beforehand. “We certainly get our guys back, so sort of work them in and try to win games along the way.”
Their guys start with Irving and Kevin Durant, the duo playing for just the second time with newcomers Drummond, Seth Curry and Goran Dragic. And while Durant, back from his MCL injury, had a quiet game by his standards — just 14 points — Irving’s season-high 50 point masterpiece made sure it was enough.
The Nets finally looked like a hungry team, both in terms of hunger and teamwork.
After dropping six of their previous seven games to fall into ninth in the Eastern Conference — and a flat-footed tie with Charlotte and Atlanta — Brooklyn (33-33) stormed out of the gate in a game with huge play-in ramifications and never let up.
“Every game is huge for us right now. What, 17 games left, Charlotte is tied with us. So it’s an important game,” Dragic said. “We finally get back Kyrie and Kevin playing together, so this is going to be our second game together. But like I said, no excuses: We have to bring it and are going to try and win.”
They did, and in convincing fashion.
In a matchup with young Hornets star LaMelo Ball, Irving led the way with a white-hot shooting performance. He hit 15 of 19 and 9 of 12 from behind the arc. It ties the most 3-pointers by a Net this season, and it’s the second-most in Irving’s career.
Drummond had a season-high 20 points and 14 rebounds, as the Nets led by as much as 34 and held the Hornets at arm’s length for a huge win.
The Nets moved into eighth place, a game ahead of both the Hornets and Hawks. They’re two behind seventh-place Toronto, where they’d go for the play-in if the season ended today.
“As long as we don’t fall out of the play-in. We know, though, that all these games mean something in the standings. It’s not like we’re just trying to get better at the expense of these games. We want to try to win these games,” coach Steve Nash said. “Can we find the cohesion and understanding quickly enough to win these games? That’s the challenge.”
The Nets looked as cohesive early on as they have at any point this season.
They used an extended 41-19 run to blow open what had been a 9-all tie. Irving’s dead-on 3-pointer made it 50-28, and they kept pouring it on.
The Nets had a 69-43 lead at the break that saw, holding Charlotte to 3 of 17 from deep. The Nets shot 55.6 percent overall, carving up the Hornets’ nonexistent defense with crisp ball movement.
The Nets had 33 assists (their season-high was 35 on Jan. 12 against the Bulls), and looked in sync.
Bruce Brown (14 points, eight rebounds, six assists) made a running layup to pad the cushion to 79-45 with 9:52 left in the third quarter.
They did see that cut to 15 in the third and 120-107 on Montrezl Harrell’s dunk with 3:53 to play. But as he had all night, Irving stemmed Charlotte’s tide with a 16-foot fadeaway.
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