Kevin Durant says the Brooklyn Nets treated Friday's 118-100 win over the Milwaukee Bucks as "bigger than a regular season" after extending their win streak to eight games.
The Nets claimed a confidence-boosting victory over the 2021 NBA champions, moving Brooklyn to a 21-12 record, while the Bucks are only slightly ahead in the Eastern Conference with a 22-10 record.
Durant scored 24 points, extending his run of games with plus 50 per cent field-goal shooting to 12, while Nic Claxton added 19 points with eight rebounds, five assists and three steals.
There were contributions all round for Brooklyn, with Kyrie Irving scoring 18 points with nine rebounds and six assists, while Ben Simmons had 12 points, 11 rebounds, eight assists and three steals. T.J. Warren chipped in 12 points and six rebounds off the bench.
All five Nets' starters reached double figures, marking the sixth time they have achieved that this season.
After a tumultuous start to the season where they commenced with a 1-5 record and had off-court issues involving Irving to deal with, the Nets have rallied to become genuine contenders.
"It's good for us," Durant told reporters. It's good for us to keep stacking days. We respect Milwaukee, we understand how dominant they've been this season.
"We wanted to come out and we understand everyone is watching this game, everybody looked at this as bigger than a regular season game, so I think we tried to approach it that way.
"I know those guys play extremely hard every night, we tried to match that. They play playoff style basketball every game so it was on us to match it and play our brand as well.
"We've been trying to stay at their level as consistently as we can. It's tough to do in the regular season with injuries and the ebb and flow of the season but we tried to stay locked in as much as we can."
Durant called the victory a "great team win" for the Nets given the raft of contributions, creating 30 assists compared to the Bucks' 17, and forcing 18 turnovers.
"We were locked in all night on both sides of the ball," Durant said. "We were able to get a nice cushion early.
"They're a championship quality team so they're going to fight back and get into the game. We were able to make big shots and get big stops. Great team win for us."
The Nets kept Giannis Antetokounmpo scoreless in the final quarter, led by Simmons, as they weathered any late challenge, pulling away to win by 18 points after leading 85-75 at the final change.
"I thought overall the mental approach from guys, we knew they'd make some threes and we didn’t panic," Nets head coach Jacque Vaughn said.
"Giannis is going to get through us sometimes and we're not going to over-react. But we be steady throughout the night to put multiple bodies in front of him? That's tough to do, because he's coming downhill at you with force and you're going to get hit. I thought overall our guys responded extremely well."
Suns reportedly to waive Paul after 3 seasons
Chris Paul's time in the Valley of the Sun is over.
The Phoenix Suns informed Paul on Wednesday that he will be waived, according to Chris Haynes of Bleacher Report.
The 38-year-old future Hall of Famer will become a free agent after spending the last three seasons with the Suns.
With two years left on a four-year, $120million contract, Paul was due to make $30.8million this season but only $15.8million of that was guaranteed.
By clearing cap space, the Suns will now build around Kevin Durant and Devin Booker as they again try to capture the franchise's first championship under new coach Frank Vogel.
Despite being near the end of his career, Paul will still be considered one of this summer's top free agents, as he can still efficiently run an offense and excels at finding open teammates.
In his first season in Phoenix in 2020-21, he helped the Suns reach the NBA Finals, where they lost to the Milwaukee Bucks in six games.
With Paul running the point, Phoenix won a franchise-record 64 games in 2021-22, but the season ended at the hands of the Denver Nuggets in the Western Conference semi-finals.
This season also ended with the Nuggets again eliminating the Suns in the conference semis with Paul missing the final four games of the series after injuring his groin in Game 2.
A 12-time All-Star, Paul finished the 2022-23 season with a career-low 13.9 points per game, but still showed a proficiency at distributing the ball, with an average 8.9 assists to rank fourth in the NBA.
With career averages of 17.9 points, 9.5 assists, 4.5 rebounds and 2.1 steals, he is the only player in NBA history to average at least 15 points, nine assists, four rebounds and two steals.
His 11,501 career assists and 2,544 career steals are both third most in NBA history, trailing only John Stockton and Jason Kidd in both categories.
The fourth overall pick of the 2005 draft, Paul was named Rookie of the Year in 2005-06 and has been selected to the NBA All-Defensive first team seven times. The 18-year veteran has also been an All-NBA first-team selection four times, a second-team selection five years and a third-team selection twice.
Heat rally in fourth quarter to even NBA Finals at 1-1
Gabe Vincent scored 23 points and helped spark a fourth-quarter rally that propelled the Miami Heat to a 111-108 win over the Denver Nuggets on Sunday in Game 2 of the NBA Finals, evening the championship series at 1-1.
The Heat overcame an eight-point deficit to start the fourth quarter to snap the Nuggets' seven-game winning streak and send the series to Miami all tied. Game 3 will take place Wednesday.
Denver also was handed its first loss in 10 home games during this postseason despite another big effort from two-time NBA MVP Nikola Jokić, who poured in 41 points on 16-of-28 shooting along with 11 rebounds.
Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo each contributed 21 points for the Heat, while Duncan Robinson scored all 10 of his points during a pivotal 15-2 run to open the fourth quarter that sent Miami ahead to stay.
Jokic scored the final six points of the third quarter to give the Nuggets an 83-75 lead that turned out to be short-lived. Robinson had the first eight points of Miami's momentum-shifting surge, and Vincent later added a 3-pointer before hitting two free throws that put the Heat up 90-85 with nine minutes remaining.
Miami held a 107-95 advantage after Caleb Martin's 3-pointer with 3:39 left to play, but the Nuggets responded with a late charge to put the outcome back in doubt.
Aaron Gordon and Jamal Murray hit 3-pointers to ignite an 11-2 run Murray capped with another triple that pulled Denver within 109-106 entering the final minute.
After Jokic countered two Butler free throws with a short turnaround jumper with 35.6 seconds left, Butler missed a 3-pointer on the ensuing possession to give the Nuggets a chance to tie.
Murray misfired on a step-back 3-point try with 1.9 seconds left, however, and Martin grabbed the rebound as time expired.
Denver, which led by as many as 15 points in the first half, had been 11-0 this postseason when holding a double-digit lead.
Miami Heat rally late against Denver Nuggets to even NBA finals series
The Miami Heat produced a fourth-quarter comeback to win the second game of the NBA finals 111-108 and even up the seven-match series against the Denver Nuggets.
The Heat trailed by eight heading into the final period, having trailed by 15 earlier in the game in the wake of another massive performance from Nikola Jokic.
Jokic scored 41 points, scoring 16 of 28 shots from the floor including one with 36 seconds remaining which cut the Heat’s lead to three points.
But after Jimmy Butler missed on Miami’s next possession, Jamal Murray was unable to tie the scores with an effort on the buzzer.
The defeat was Denver’s first since May 7 and they had won all 11 play-off games in which they had opened a double-digit lead.
They had trailed 21-10 in the opening quarter before a barrage of three-point scores helped them to a 44-32 advantage which had been trimmed to six points at the break.
And Miami held on through the third quarter before the late surge that takes the series to Miami all square.
Gabe Vincent led the way for Miami with 23 points as Butler and Bam Adebayo each grabbed 21.
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