'Unbelievable' Durant carries Nets in battle with Knicks

NEW YORK – With Kyrie Irving reduced to a spectator while Ben Simmons’ season debut still has no timeline, the Brooklyn Nets have to squeeze every ounce of Kevin Durant’s brilliance to stay in the hunt for an outright playoff spot. 

Durant scored a season-high 53 points, six rebounds and nine assists in 43 minutes as Irving watched courtside, joining the Barclays Center’s sellout crowd of 18,057 that witnessed the masterclass. 

Durant fought through 10 straight New York Knicks’ blitz defense down the stretch to hit the go-ahead 3-pointer and the game-sealing free throws in the Nets’ 110-107 win Sunday (Monday, Manila time). 

“Kevin was unbelievable,” Nets coach Steve Nash said. He carried us and made a lot of big plays. He was Kevin Durant on full display.”

Durant did not mind carrying the Nets (35-33) on his back as they moved 3.5 games behind sixth seed Cleveland Cavaliers (38-29) for the final outright playoff spot. But the Nets might be playing with fire as Durant earlier missed 21 games due to sprained MCL. The 33-year old superstar is also just 15 months removed from a devastating Achilles heel injury. 

“We hope we can keep him under 40 [minutes],” Nash said of Durant. “Tonight, though, was one of those games where we just needed him.”

Irving attended his first home game this season after New York City relaxed on the vaccine mandate allowing unvaccinated people to enter public venues. But a private-sector mandate requiring New York workers to be vaccinated keeps Irving from playing in New York. The Nets organization was fined $50,000 for allowing Irving to enter their locker room during halftime and postgame. 

Aside from Irving and Simmons, several of Brooklyn’s key players also missed the game against their crosstown rival Knicks. Seth Curry was a late scratch with left ankle soreness. LaMarcus Aldridge remained out with a hip injury while Joe Harris had season-ending ankle surgery. 

Durant sensed as the game wore on that he needed to do more as the Knicks valiantly fought back from several Nets’ leads that went as high as 12. 

“I don’t really like to pre-determine what I’m going to do out there. I just try to go with the flow and do what’s required of me,” Durant said. “I felt like tonight we were shorthanded a bit in the scoring department. 

Durant became the seventh player all-time with multiple 50-point, nine-assist games in a season, joining Nate Archibald, Rick Barry, LeBron James (twice), James Harden (three times), Russell Westbrook, and Damian Lillard. Durant had 51 points and nine assists against the Detroit Pistons last month. He also came one point shy of matching his career-high, but he still broke the franchise record for most points against the Knicks held by John Williamson’s 43 points in 1978. 

But Durant did not just single-handedly beat the Knicks. He controlled the game and bent the Knicks’ defense that allowed his unheralded supporting cast to level up next to him. 

“You feel kind of at ease knowing that you can affect so many different plays and different areas of the game with my skill set and I can affect my teammates on how they approach the game. So, I just try to think about the big picture,” Durant said. 

“I know I worked on my game, and I’ve gotten to this point as an individual player, but it’s another point of my career. It’s like, all right, how can I impact everybody out here. How can I make the other coaches think about their game plans? So, I feel like I upped the level of everybody out on the floor, and that’s a good feeling to have,” he added. 

Durant forced Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau to throw double-teams at him as early as he crosses the half court. His teammates capitalized with more space to operate. 

Nets’ starting center Andre Drummond had 18 points and 10 rebounds. Drummond scored on a dunk late in the fourth quarter to tie the game that set up Durant’s endgame heroics. 

Drummond’s backup, Nic Claxton, added 10 points, five rebounds and two steals. 

Bruce Brown frolicked the paint like a big man, dropping 15 points, including eight in the third quarter. The 6-foot-4 Brown collected seven rebounds, five assists, and two steals, with the last one coming off Evan Fournier’s pass in the final 9.2 seconds. 

“They’re just doubling Kev (Durant), and I just started flashing to the middle, and I knew Julius (Randle) did not want to foul,” Brown said when Philstar.com asked about his mindset of attacking the paint. 

Randle was saddled with four fouls but still led the Knicks with 25 points on 13 shots. But he was no match to Durant’s star power. In the end, the Nets have what the Knicks don’t, which ultimately decided the game’s outcome. 

“[Durant] is one of the best ever to do it. So, it’s tough when he gets hot like that,” Knicks third-year forward RJ Barrett said. “It was a close game. We had opportunities. We had chances. But especially the shot he hit with a minute left was a big shot.”

Durant gave up the ball when the Knicks blitzed him for the ninth straight possession approaching the final minute. But the ball found Durant back, who hit the go-ahead three-pointer over Barrett with 56 seconds left. 

“You can throw a lot of bodies at [Durant]. You can be physical, but once he elevates, his release is so high, and he’s so tall, it’s just him and the rim,” Fournier said. 

But this time, the rest of the Nets elevated with Durant. 

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Alder Almo is a former senior sportswriter for Philstar.com and NBA.com Philippines. He is now based in Jersey City, New Jersey, and writes for the New York-based sports website empiresportsmedia.com.