The Nets were in first place in the Eastern Conference on Jan. 22, having just taken down the Spurs on the road for their third win in their last four games.
Less than two weeks later, Brooklyn has slipped down to sixth in the East after losing its fifth straight game on Tuesday night, as the team continues to desperately miss Kevin Durant while trying to hold its place above the play-in line in the standings.
"We're improving, but the reality is, we lost five in a row," Harden said after the Nets fell by 10 to one of the best teams in the NBA in the Suns. "Good thing about this league is you have an opportunity tomorrow to bounce back and feel good about yourself and get off of this little slump that we've been on."
Indeed, Brooklyn will immediately have another chance to snap its losing streak on Wednesday night when it takes on the Kings, but the reality is, the Nets have been slipping considerably since the calendar turned to 2022. Only the Magic have a worse record since the end of 2021, and Brooklyn is now losers of 12 of its last 18 games, and are now just eight games above .500 and searching for optimism as the Hornets sit just 1.5 games back of forcing the Nets into a play-in spot.
"This is one of those tests where we'll remember it down the line and later in the season that we made some growth in this span," Kyrie Irving said.
The Nets will continue to have Irving for the rest of this road trip, but wait for Durant and Joe Harris' return before taking on top teams like the Nuggets, Jazz and Heat over the next 10 days. If the Nets can't turn things around quickly, their hold on a top-six spot will continue to slip away.
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