Will the Nets redeem themselves ahead of a pivotal March? Here's the breakdown.
OK, let's try this again if you're the Brooklyn Nets.
The Miami Heat smashed the visitors on Tuesday 124-98. Now Brooklyn can attempt to redeem itself from that debacle...by facing the Heat again.
In a rare scheduling moment, the Nets will take on the same team from Tuesday. Rare in the NBA that two teams would face each other twice in a span of three days inside the same venue. In this case, the Kaseya Center will host Nets-Heat.
Miami entered the Tuesday contest as a 13-point favorite by FanDuel Sportsbook and exceeded the spread. The line must be higher for this one, right?
It's actually the same: FanDuel is plugging Miami as the favorite by the same margin as of Thursday afternoon.
But this contest will either be equally ugly like Tuesday's contest, or somewhat competitive. There's no in-between here.
What were any positives from the Nets in that infamous loss? Danny Wolf continues to contribute in a big way by scoring 11 points and pulling down five rebounds. He even showed his facilitator side by dishing out five assists.
Day'Ron Sharpe stepped his game up too. Sharpe nearly reached double-double status: 10 points with eight rebounds. Sharpe delivered four assists too in the loss.
Noah Clowney and Ziaire Williams emerged too -- Clowney scoring 17 points while Williams finished with 16.
But Tuesday witnessed some notable Nets stars struggle, including leading scorer Michael Porter Jr. who settled for just nine points. And MPJ hit that mark off 3-of-17 shooting through 27 minutes.
Rookie Nolan Traore struggled too; scoring 14 points but turning the ball over six times.
Egor Demin wasn't in action for this Nets-Heat contest, with head coach Jordi Fernandez calling it an injury management decision. Demin has missed the last three games and his status for Thursday hasn't been made official yet.
The YES Network once again will air the action for Nets fans. FanDuel Sports Network Sun (serving the Heat audience) also has the game available.
Regardless if Demin plays or not, it's not likely that the Nets will pull the upset against a Heat team making a late playoff push.
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