East River Showdown: Flatbush Sweeps Season Series From Manhattan

From the desks: THE HOOPS OF FLATBUSH & KICKING CANS DOWN 33RD STREET WITH JIMMY

EAST RIVER SHOWDOWN 

Nets defeat Knicks; 3-0

I - BKN 116; NYK 109

II - BKN 117; NYK 112

III - BKN 114; NYK 112

No Kevin Durant, No Blake Griffin, No DeAndre Jordan, Essentially No James Harden, and No Room For Error.

Monday's Nets victory was a costly one.  Already playing on a barking hamstring, James Harden was out of the game after just four minutes on the floor.  

Yet, he somehow tied for second on the team with three assists ...

That's because Kyrie Irving took charge in a manner unlike Sunday's game against the Bulls when he finished with 15 assists and 24 points.  Irving led the team with seven assists but topped all players with 40 points in 37 minutes.  It's the fourth time this season he has scored forty or more, and it was slightly more than double Julius Randle's output, who finished with 19 points in a game-high 39 minutes.  Randle achieves the triple-double with a game-high 15 rebounds and 12 assists, albeit in a losing effort.

RJ Barrett led the Knicks with 22 points in 33 minutes, Reggie Bullock added 21 points in 31 minutes, and Derrick Rose scored 16 points in 25 minutes off the bench.

Nerlens Noel going up against LaMarcus Aldridge and Nicolas Claxton was essentially a wash.  Noel scored six points with five rebounds, while Aldridge and Claxton joined together for eight points and twelve rebounds.  DeAndre Jordan has not played a minute since the acquisition of Aldridge.

Jeff Green's tenacity resulted in him leading the Nets with 13 attempts from the line and 4/8 inside the arc en route to 23 points in 36 minutes.  Joe Harris put up the third-most attempts behind Irving and Green while scoring 16 points in 34 minutes.  Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot played his most minutes since Mar. 24 at Utah.

Both teams scored equally fourteen points on fast breaks.  But whereas the Knicks outscored the Nets by 12 points from behind the arc, the Nets dominated the paint by a 58-40 margin.  Brooklyn was also plus-four in rebounds and plus-three in assists.

The Knicks led the Nets by ten at the half (and at one point led by 14 points) but failed to hold on.  Brooklyn outscored the Knicks by eleven points in the third.  Alec Burks tied the game at 112-112 with 26.1 seconds left in the fourth.  But Jeff Green converted two free throws with 3.7 seconds left to clinch it for Brooklyn.

Flatbush sweeps the season series three games to none.  The Knicks fall back one game under par.

Since losing at Detroit on Feb. 9, the Nets have posted a 21-4 record over their last 25 games.  Meanwhile, Kyrie Irving, Kevin Durant, and James Harden have only played seven games together with only 21 games left in the regular season.  This team needs to get healthy and just over a month to get it done.