<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">Although coach Lawrence Frank's unusual strategy did not end the New Jersey Nets' losing streak, it surely got his players' attention. The Nets will try to end their four-game skid when they finish a four-game road trip against the Los Angeles Lakers at Staples Center on Sunday. With his team facing a 19-point deficit entering the fourth quarter at Phoenix on Friday, Frank benched his starters, including Jason Kidd and Vince Carter, and watched his reserves whittle the Suns' lead to three with 21 seconds left. "It was pretty obvious why he left them in," Carter said. "They had great energy, they were getting stops and were really playing together. They really played great. I'm not mad about it at all. I'm all about winning, and that unit gave us something tonight." Rookie Marcus Williams keyed the late surge, scoring 21 of his 27 points in the quarter, including 13 in a row to get the Nets within 96-93. Steve Nash, though, sealed the win with three free throws as Phoenix won 99-93. "I got a couple of stops, I got a couple of baskets, and I got some confidence," said Williams, averaging 8.3 points this season. Carter finished with 23 points, but played only 29.5 seconds of the fourth quarter. Kidd had seven points on 3-of-12 shooting with eight rebounds and five assists before sitting out the fourth. "That group that finished the game deserves a great deal of credit in their fight," Frank said. "We were going to either win or lose with that group, because they earned it." Frank's team was outscored by a combined 25 points in the fourth quarter of its previous two games, mostly with the starters on the floor. The Nets (5-7) are in danger of dropping five in a row for the first time since a nine-game skid from Nov. 10-28, 2004. New Jersey, the Atlantic Division champion four of the past five years, has started slowly for the fourth straight season. It was 9-12 last year, 2-11 in 2004-05 and 7-11 in 2003-04. Starting forward Richard Jefferson, who recently missed five games with a sprained left ankle, took a step back Friday after a strong performance at Portland on Tuesday. He was limited to six points on 2-of-8 from the field with four turnovers in 31 minutes. The Lakers (8-4) couldn't protect a seven-point fourth-quarter lead and had their four-game win streak stopped with a 114-108 loss Friday at Utah, owner of the NBA's best record. Kobe Bryant led Los Angeles with 27 points, but went 0-for-3 from the field in the fourth. The Lakers were 6-of-17 from the floor and outrebounded 16-4 in the final period. The Jazz dominated the Lakers on the glass 45-27, and outscored them 23-9 on second-chance points. "I told them they had nothing to be ashamed of except that rebound total when they look at it," Lakers coach Phil Jackson said. With their four-game overall win streak over, Los Angeles will focus on extending a four-game home win streak Sunday. Only Utah, at 7-0, owns a better home record than the Lakers, who are 7-1. Friday's loss was the Lakers' only true road game between Nov. 10 and Dec. 10. Of their 14 games in that span, 12 are at home while the only road contests are against Utah and the Clippers at Staples Center on Dec. 2. Bryant scored 46 points the last time these teams met in Los Angeles on Nov. 27, but the Nets won 102-96 in overtime. New Jersey has won six of nine overall and two straight on the road in this series. </div> Link Well, there was no official game-thread made, so just discuss the game here. Lakers are down 18-12
Big Third Quarter Propels Lakers Past Nets <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">LOS ANGELES, Nov. 26 (AP) -- The stars led the way. It was the other guys who made the difference. Lamar Odom scored 21 points, Kobe Bryant added 19 points and a season-high 10 assists, and the Los Angeles Lakers beat the New Jersey Nets 99-93 on Sunday night. But the two combined to make 14 shots in 40 attempts. Their teammates were 23-of-42. "That's a team victory,'' said Odom, who shot 6-for-16. "We hit open shots tonight.'' Luke Walton shot 4-of-7 including 2-of-2 from 3-point range to make him 13-of-19 overall this season. Rookie Jordan Farmar was 4-of-8 including 3-of-5 from beyond the arc, and Smush Parker was 5-of-10 including 2-of-5 on 3-pointers. "When Smush was in there, he gave us a great boost,'' said Bryant, who shot just 8-of-24. "And then the young fella (Farmar) came in and played extremely well, and Kwame (Brown) did, too. "They're ready, they're stepping up and hitting shots. Luke's leading the league in 3-point shooting accuracy.'' Brown had 13 points and nine rebounds, Parker added 13 points, Farmar scored 11 and Walton had 10. "We had a big surge in that third quarter that got us over the hump,'' said Lakers coach Phil Jackson, whose team outscored the Nets 30-18 in the third period to go ahead for good. "We played some defense and got some things done out there that I thought were a little more indicative of what we were asking this team to do.'' Regarding Bryant's low shooting percentage, Jackson said: "They played him well - and they have two players that do a good job on him.'' Jackson referred to Vince Carter and Jason Kidd. "They effectively defend as a group,'' Jackson said. "They're a team that knows the rules of our game to defend the lane well. The middle was pretty tough to penetrate out there, and Kobe didn't find a way to the basket very easily tonight.'' Carter had 21 points and 11 rebounds, Nenad Krstic scored 20, and Kidd had 16 assists for the Nets, who lost their fifth straight - all to Western Conference teams. "We fought hard and I thought our guys did as good a job as you could against Kobe and Lamar,'' Nets coach Lawrence Frank said. "Those other guys stepped up and made shots due to our help situations, so you've got to give Kobe credit for giving it to them and those guys credit for making the shots.'' Farmar outscored New Jersey 5-1 by himself to give the Lakers an 80-69 lead early in the fourth quarter. The Nets battled back, drawing within two on a basket by Krstic, but Odom's five points during a 7-1 run made it 95-87 with 3+ minutes to play. Walton's 3-pointer with 1:53 left extended the Lakers' lead to 98-89, but the Nets scored the next four points before Kidd's miss with 20 seconds to go. Bryant made a free throw three seconds later to complete the scoring. "A lot of us have been through a lot of streaks, so for the young guys, maybe it can wear on them,'' Kidd said. "But we're a veteran ballclub. We've lost five in a row, we've got to find a way to turn it around. ``As fast as you can lose five in a row, you can win, you know, 15, so we just have to stay together.'' Odom and Walton scored five points each during an 18-7 run that gave Los Angeles a 64-60 lead - their first since the opening minute of play. The Nets drew within one before the Lakers outscored them 7-1 to finish the third period, putting them on top 73-66. Rookie Marcus Williams, who scored a career-high 27 points Friday night in a 99-93 loss at Phoenix, scored 14 points in 11 first-half minutes, sparking the Nets to a 48-43 lead. New Jersey led 33-24 after one period of play thanks to a 14-of-20 shooting performance. </div> Full recap at NBA.com Woohoo!
Sweet win. Kobe with 10 assists. Now what to everyone who says he cant share the ball. The Lakers are for real, and I love that Kobe is giving these guys his confidence. It was a good win after a tough loss on the road against Utah.
<div class="quote_poster">Trench Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Sweet win. Kobe with 10 assists. Now what to everyone who says he cant share the ball. The Lakers are for real, and I love that Kobe is giving these guys his confidence. It was a good win after a tough loss on the road against Utah.</div> Yeah Kobe had 10 assists, but how bout all that crappy ball hogging he was doing? You got a GREAT defender like Kidd on you most of the game, why the hell force it? Him and Carter were going at it all game, Kobe was trying WAY TOO HARD to try and score on Vince, it was very noticable. Kobe should have had 15 assists this game if he didn't force up such crap. But, since I love my boy KObe, I'll let it slide since we got the W. =)
I just saw the highlights on the NBATV broadband thing. Did anybody else here see Kobe smack Jason Collins ass after he made the 3 that put away the game?
I like how Odom says "...we hit open shots tonight" when he was 6 for 16 what is that like 40% shooting avg?
Early in the game kobe was throwing up bricks... i dont like the fact that he shot 8 - 24 fro mthe field... the nets should have been finished early in the 3rd if he shot above 50%
Has anyone noticed that a lot of our W's are real iffy? Like, we'll shoot average to bad, defense is sometimes horrid, and it'll be close game all the way through. I love our wins but I'm still really uneasy.
<div class="quote_poster">illmatic Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Yeah Kobe had 10 assists, but how bout all that crappy ball hogging he was doing? You got a GREAT defender like Kidd on you most of the game, why the hell force it? Him and Carter were going at it all game, Kobe was trying WAY TOO HARD to try and score on Vince, it was very noticable. Kobe should have had 15 assists this game if he didn't force up such crap. But, since I love my boy KObe, I'll let it slide since we got the W. =)</div> I agree to an extent. Kobe was forcing shots, but I think he came out more aggressive because he was passive in the 4th against the Jazz and he wanted to jump on the Nets early. Kobe couldn't get any calls last night. Late in the game when it was apparent that he wasn't going to back down, the Nets we're nearly murdering him but he just couldn't get to the line. Kidd held him mostly in the 4th and was having trouble. Kobe played great defense and was clearly in VC head all night. Kobe stuck to him every where he went. Ok I know my response was all over the place but I had just a few points I wanted to throw out.
<div class="quote_poster">Franchise4Ever Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Has anyone noticed that a lot of our W's are real iffy? Like, we'll shoot average to bad, defense is sometimes horrid, and it'll be close game all the way through. I love our wins but I'm still really uneasy.</div> That's what it's all about. These our the games we were losing last year. I've caught myself numerous times this season thinking, "here we go again", but they have managed to hold on. My confidence is growing game by game. It's a shame that we dropped the game to Utah the other night. But besides that, I've been impressed with the way we're closing out games.
<div class="quote_poster">Franchise4Ever Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Has anyone noticed that a lot of our W's are real iffy? Like, we'll shoot average to bad, defense is sometimes horrid, and it'll be close game all the way through. I love our wins but I'm still really uneasy.</div> That's why I'm not completely sold on this team yet. We are definetly better than last season, no doubt. But a lot of our games thus far have been at home. Once we start on playing on the road, we can really start to see how good this team really is. A lot of our games wouldn't have been wins had we not have been at home and had the home crowd energy. Although we haven't played much on the road as of yet, our record on the road has not been something to brag about
