The Nets' primary mission on their trip to Charlotte on Saturday, obviously, is to beat one of the five other teams challenging them for the final three seeds in the Eastern Conference playoff race.
While there, the Nets might also want to kidnap Hornets forward Frank Kaminsky and get him on the plane back to Brooklyn in time for Monday's matchup with the Spurs at Barclays Center.
That's because the Nets got a rude reality check on Thursday night in their first game following the All-Star break. Portland brutalized Brooklyn inside en route to a 113-99 victory at a sold-out Barclays Center for "Ian Eagle Night."
The Nets' seventh loss in their last 10 games dropped them to .500 at 30-30, which is still good for sixth in the East by two-and-a-half games over Orlando and Miami.
A few more nights like Thursday, however, and that lead will disappear faster than the NBA Twitter rush to have Duke University's Zion Williamson call it a college career.
Portland centers Jusuf Nurkic and Enes Kanter combined to score 45 points on 18-for-24 shooting with 21 rebounds, including eight of the Blazers' 19 total offensive boards that led to 22 second-chance points.
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While it was on Nets centers Jarrett Allen and Ed Davis, who went for 15/10 in his first game facing his former team, for not matching the physicality brought by Nurkic and Kanter on their post moves, the Nets' bigs could have used some help on the glass. That is, you know, if the Nets actually had a real power forward on their roster.
Yes, it's a recurring theme of mine, but it bears repeating until the problem is addressed. At this point, the Nets are kidding themselves if they believe they can handle their difficult upcoming schedule and hold on to a playoff seed using a rotation of Treveon Graham, Rondae Hollis-Jefferson and Jared Dudley, with sprinkles of DeMarre Carroll and Joe Harris in ultra-small-ball lineups, at the four spot.
It's unconscionable that Nets coach Kenny Atkinson continues to ride Hollis-Jefferson with his first bench unit. I get that Hollis-Jefferson had a strong statistical showing in the last game before the break in Cleveland, but there was nothing new there. As he does every fourth or fifth game, he got a higher percentage of those crazy, off-balance attempts at the rim to go down.
Only 1-of-6 fell on Thursday (to make Hollis-Jefferson 125-for-259 at the rim on the season, the second-worst percentage in the league among those with over 200 such attempts). Sadder still was that the one bucket accounted for the only two points the Nets' power forward trio produced in almost 39 minutes of combined action.
And while Hollis-Jefferson also produced all of the position's defensive rebounds (three), what was more striking was that the Nets only grabbed 57.7 percent of the available defensive rebounds when he was on the court, per NBA.com. Only Dudley (57.1 percent) and wing Allen Crabbe were worse (55.8 percent) on Thursday.
This season, the Nets are 21st in defensive rebounding percentage (72.1). But they're 28th in their last four games, a concern of Atkinson's going into Thursday's game.
"I think our rebounding has slipped," Atkinson said. "If you hark back to that eight-game losing streak (earlier in the season), that was a problem."
According to Atkinson's internal numbers, the Nets' rebounding has actually been better when they've played zone, which runs contrary to conventional wisdom.
"I thought that was a myth," Atkinson said of the weaker rebounding when playing zone theory. "You should be able to rebound (in a zone). I'll have to look at the numbers for tonight, but I thought that it was mostly man-to-man where (Portland) dominated us on the boards."
I guess it shouldn't be shocking when you consider the Nets' relatively glaring lack of size up front. Graham, the starting four, is listed at 6 feet 5 inches, while Hollis-Jefferson is a lean 6-foot-7. Dudley, who returned to the court after missing 16 games with a hamstring injury, is an Earth-bound 6-foot-7.
Rookie sparkplug Rodions Kurucs, who somehow went from starting 29 straight contests to being totally out of the rotation in the last two games, has never been considered for the power forward job despite his 6-foot-9 listing.
What does this have to do with Kaminsky? Well, he's a seven-footer with a nearly 35 percent three-point rate. He's not a monster on the glass, but the Hornets have been a statistically better rebounding team with him on the court versus off the last two seasons. The same goes for Kaminsky's general defensive struggles, which also are not reflected in his team's on/off-court advanced stats.
Though he's been buried on Charlotte's bench for most of this season, Kaminsky to date has been unable to reach an agreement on a buyout which would let him go somewhere he is needed … Like Brooklyn.
Really, any power forward that hits the buyout market will do, as it's the Nets' last hope to rectify a weakness that has been apparent for three years.
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A quick suggestion here which might help get the Nets back on track.
It's clear to me that D'Angelo Russell is again having difficulties adjusting to sharing the court with another dominant ballhandler now that Caris LeVert has returned from a 42-game absence. Russell has a 39.3/25.6 shooting split in his last four games. As I noted in my post last week, it would have been much worse if not for Russell's 6-for-6 explosion in the third overtime in Cleveland after LeVert exhausted his minutes limit.
So how about using LeVert in the old Spencer Dinwiddie role off the bench, at least until Dinwiddie recovers from his right thumb surgery? The total minutes wouldn't change. It would just be less minutes when they're sharing the court, where their two-man net rating has been -5.3 points per 100 possessions in the last four games, per NBA.com.
In this rotation, the Nets would also be less reliant on the inconsistent whims of Shabazz Napier in their second unit. The potential starting lineup of Russell, Crabbe, Joe Harris, Dudley and Allen has the best net rating (plus-10.2 points per 100 possessions) among Nets lineups with at least 50 minutes played.
The Nets need Russell to play at an All-Star level. If this twist gives him a better chance, where's the harm?
For a FAN's perspective of the Nets, Devils and Jets, follow Steve on Twitter @SteveLichtenst1
