The Nets were assured of a spot in the Play-In Tournament, and held their own destiny entering Sunday’s season finale against the Pacers – and when they won and Cleveland beat Milwaukee, the matchup was set: Nets vs.
Cavs, Tuesday night at Barclays Center.
Jarrett Allen’s status is uncertain, as Cleveland isn’t sure if he’ll be able to return from the broken finger that has kept him sidelined, but there’s one former Cav champ looking forward to the battle: Kyrie Irving.
“Let’s get it on,” Irving said after Sunday’s season finale. “This is a special time of the year, and going against a team like the Cavaliers is something to look forward to. We have to go home and think about all the possessions that happened the other night, learn from them, and take what you can into Tuesday. We’re going to make adjustments, they’re going to make adjustments, and it’s going to be an all-out battle.”
The two teams just played on Friday night, with Brooklyn’s 118-107 win at Barclays Center giving them a leg up on the Play-In race, and the Nets won the season series 3-1 (including both games in BKN).
But, as Kyrie noted, the playoffs are a different animal, and both teams will go all out knowing that, even if they lose Tuesday, they’ll have a second chance Friday night against the winner of the 9-10 game between the Hawks and Hornets to secure a playoff berth.
For Brooklyn, they enter coming off four straight wins to finish the regular season, including the one against Cleveland that vaulted them from tenth to seventh over the season’s final week.
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"We stayed with it. We all had one goal in mind and we saw it through," center Andre Drummond said. "We finished off the year great."
Added Kyrie: “Now we get to carry some of that momentum on into Tuesday.”
On the other side, the Cavs won their season finale against a Milwaukee squad missing Giannis Antetokounmpo Sunday, but they had lost eight of their previous 10 before that to drop from sixth to eighth, from fighting for fifth to fighting to stay in the top play-in game.
That’s fine with them, because everyone is 0-0 once again.
“I like our chances when it comes down to a dog fight," Kevin Love said Sunday. "That's what it's going to be come Tuesday night."
And, while they need to win either Tuesday or Friday to make the playoffs – the first time they will have done so without LeBron James since 1998 – coach J.B. Bickerstaff wants the Cavs to appreciate how far they’ve come, even with the end-of-season swoon, after going 22-50 last season.
"These opportunities, and this is what I want our guys to understand, they're not promised, they're not guaranteed," Bickerstaff said. "We have guys on this team that it took them six or seven years to get to the playoffs. Me, personally, it was my ninth season before I had an opportunity to compete in a playoff, so this is noting that just because you are around the league, it's guaranteed."
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