NEW YORK _ For the first three games of the season, they were known as the "Comeback Nets" after rallying from behind in all three games to win or make it close. But the 29-point hole the Nets dug in the second half Monday night at Barclays Center was far too deep to survive in a 118-88 loss to the Bulls that underlined how much work they have to do to gain respectability in the NBA.
With the game out of reach in the fourth quarter, Bulls star Dwyane Wade was amusing himself and getting a rise out of the crowd by displaying his array of crossover moves. It was that kind of embarrassing night for the Nets, who ultimately trailed by 33 in the fourth quarter, shot 34.4 percent from the field, made only 5 of 31 3-point attempts and were outrebounded 58-45.
Bojan Bogdanovic led the Nets with 15 points, and they got 14 from Jeremy Lin and 13 from Brook Lopez. Those three made 16 of the 31 shots they took. The rest of the roster hit only 17 of 65. The Bulls had seven players in double figures topped by Jimmy Butler with 22 and Nikola Mirotic with 16.
After staying home from Milwaukee for rest prescribed by the Nets' performance team, Lopez returned to the lineup. Coach Kenny Atkinson previously said the rest doesn't mean Lopez will be held out of back-to-back games all season, so the natural question was whether the Nets might simply limit his minutes in back-to-back games in order to keep him available.
"We're taking it in chunks of the season," Atkinson explained. "It's going to depend on a lot of variables. It's something we look at and talk about and we study. There's an overall plan, and then, on a game-to-game basis, you might have to adjust that, depending on a lot of things."
It was an opportunity for Lopez to face off against his twin brother Robin, who was credited before the game by Bulls coach Fred Hoiberg for improving Chicago's rebounding and interior defense. Just as they did in the home opener against the Pacers, the Nets tried to establish Lopez early.
But he was out of sync, and the Bulls hit seven of their first 10 shots to take an 18-9 lead. From there, things quickly spun out of control for the cold-shooting Nets. By the end of the first quarter, they trailed 38-20 after allowing the Bulls to shoot 57.7 percent from the field, including 13 points from Butler.
Lin was the Nets' only effective offensive weapon with 11 points on 5-for-5 shooting. But his teammates made only 3 of 17 field-goal attempts in the opening period.
The Bulls' lead reached a high of 25 points in the second period as Isaiah Canaan scored all 13 of his first-half points on 4-for-4 shooting, including three 3-pointers. The Nets made a brief push in the third quarter to cut the deficit to 18 at 71-53 on a Lopez layup. But his brother Robin countered at the other end to trigger an 11-2 Bulls run, including five points by Butler for a lead of 82-55.
The margin reached 29 points on a three by Mirotic just before a layup by Luis Scola cut the Nets' deficit to 93-66 heading to the fourth quarter. The Nets were the highest-scoring fourth-quarter team in the NBA the first three games, but this was a tall order. Much too tall.
