OKLAHOMA CITY — Here’s the bottom line: The Nets are what they were supposed to be this season — mediocre, middling.
With a chance to be more.
But not unless they fix a defense that is, right now, badly broken.
That’s going to take working at trust.
And trusting in the work.
“Yeah, just every day. You know, that’s what it is, just being in the gym. Whenever they’re coaching and teaching us, you’ve got to lock in, and everybody’s got to be on a string,” said Mikal Bridges, making a blunt admission. “But yeah, we’re just not good right now, and we’ve just got to be better.”
The Nets head into Sunday’s game at Oklahoma City at just 15-17, somehow ninth in the Eastern Conference but stinging off a loss to woeful Washington.
They’ve dropped seven of their last nine as a result of a defense that has cratered.
Their defensive rating (122.7) is third-worst in the league during this skid.
“Just us not guarding in general,” Bridges said. “I think we’ve just all got to be locked in and knowing what we’re doing in the pick-and-roll defensively, and when to help and when to rotate and everything like that.
“We’re still not on the same page with things like that. So it makes it tough because if you think one guy is going to step up and he doesn’t, it kind of ruins the whole thing. So we’ve just got to be more in tune, and trust in what we’re doing.”
Any defensive failings will be laid bare by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and his Thunder (21-9), second in the West and winners of three straight.
The Nets play them twice within four games, sandwiched around a back-to-back at New Orleans and Houston.
The way they were guarding a month ago, that would have been a tough slate. Now? It’s a recipe for disaster.
“We have stretches we’ve looked really good, and stretches we look really bad. Just call it how it is,” Cam Thomas said. “Just got to stay consistent. That’s really the main thing, staying consistent as a team. And if the other team does go on a run, we can’t really start pointing fingers or getting down.
“This is the NBA. Everybody is going to go on a run whether we want them to or not. It is what it is. They’re going to go on a run, so we’ve just got to stick together as a team and stay consistent throughout the game.”
The Nets went 7-2 in one of those hot stretches Thomas was talking about — defending well, getting out in transition and winning games.
They even beat old friend Kevin Durant to ruin the debut of his new Big 3 in Phoenix.
But they’ve immediately reversed those fortunes, going 2-7 since.
They posted the fourth-worst net rating (minus-8.3) in the league during this skid, and allowed the second-highest 3-point percentage (41.6).
Their inability to get on the same page and get stops has them taking the ball out of the net.
That, plus the injury to Ben Simmons, has short-circuited their own running game.
For a team that needs transition, that’s an issue — as is a glaring lack of desperation.
“Our ability to do our jobs every single possession, we’re still learning that, and that’s a task for this group. We’ve got to go into every game with a sense of desperation no matter who we’re playing,” said coach Jacque Vaughn, who saw his Nets surrender 50.5 percent shooting to one of the worst teams in the NBA. “We just couldn’t get stops and a lot of it was [not] being able to guard your yard, and guard the dude in front of you.
“That focus and concentration level was not there from us and you pay for it. [I’m] always talking about, ‘These are good teams, and these are dudes who can score.’ You give them confidence and ability to have rhythm and you don’t break that rhythm and you don’t dictate actions, then you pay for it.”
Gilgeous-Alexander — averaging 31.4 points — can make them pay dearly. Unless they start trusting each other.