The Hump Dominates, but Nets Lose at Home Again

The Hump finishing on one of his Hump Dunks. Despite a career night, the Nets needed more if they wanted to pick up the W.

The shorthanded Nets fell to the Milwaukee Bucks at home tonight 105-99 despite a career night from Kris Humphries. The Nets looked great early on in this game in the first half, but were unable to hold off the Bucks, who were actually playing in an important game. The Bucks came in to the night just a game behind the Knicks for the 8th spot in the eastern conference, so playing a bad team like the Nets is a must win. Additionally, the Knicks are in Chicago tonight, and that will probably be a loss, and the Bucks have the tiebreaker with the Knicks because they beat them twice this year (I was at one of those game, read the recap here). In fact, that game was very similar to this one in many ways. Brandon Jennings had 36 points and 6 3’s in that game, while he had 34 and 6 3’s tonight. Another impressive Buck was KHH all-star Drew Gooden, who had 10 points and 11 rebounds. He had an even better game tonight with 23 points, 8 rebounds, and 7 assists (seriously, Nets?!?) The Bucks won that game and I was very happy, but I am not quite as happy tonight. However, I am not upset either because even though Nets fans would like to think it, the Nets have a 0% chance of making the playoffs, even if they magically can acquire Dwight Howard at the trade deadline (not likely) and I want the Bucks to catch the Knicks. If the Knicks were to miss the playoffs, they will be by far the most talented team to not make the playoffs and I will be very happy. I guess the Bucks just play well in KHH games and I wish them the best of luck throughout the rest of the season. On to the individual player notes from the game.

Brandon Jennings was very impressive yet again tonight.

For the Nets, the obvious star tonight was The Hump, mainly the first half Hump (though he was not bad in the second half). First, let me say that his career high was 25 points (we were there). He had 21 points and 10 rebounds at halftime. In the game, he had 31 points, 18 rebounds, 2 steals, and 3 Hump Blocks. Clearly a career night, but it’s just too bad it came in a loss. This game was clearly a tale of two halves, with the first half being fun and exciting for the Nets and the second half being what we have become used to as “Nets Basketball”. In the first quarter especially, the offense was as good as it has been all year despite not having D-Will. The Hump was attacking the basket, Morrow was hitting all his shots, and Gerald Green was getting to the rim. My two favorite plays were, off of a steal, Humphries ran the fast break and finished with a Hump Dunk. No Buck was going to get in his way, and he finished with a Gadzuric amount of authority. Another great play was an alley-oop from Farmar to Green who finished strong, knocking the ball way out of bounds after the finish. It was not nearly as good as his alley-oop on Saturday against Houston, but it was still a great play. In the second half, however, the Nets’ offense died and so did their team. Humphries did not have a bad half-10 points, 8 rebounds, but nobody else did anything and the Nets fell apart. With a nine point lead and about 2 minutes remaining in the third quarter, all the momentum switched to the Bucks. They went on a 9-0 run to end the quarter, capped by a buzzer-beating 3 by Beno Udrih (ewww) to tie the game. The Bucks never looked back and led by as many as 10 points in the fourth quarter. Brandon Jennings made some impossible 3’s, and although Jordan Farmar tried his hardest, he simply could not answer. Other than Farmar, nobody did anything in the fourth quarter, and Farmar honestly did not even do that much. Another disappointing Net was Marshon Brooks, who was coming off arguably his most balanced game in the NBA to date. He only had 10 points and he turned the ball over 5 times. He often looked lost on offense without Deron feeding him the ball and made some really, really bad decisions. Also, Sundiata is just not a backup point guard. He’s not good enough. He’s a good third string, but not a good backup, which is what Avery asked of him tonight. He had 4 turnovers in only 12 minutes, which is not what you want from a point guard. Morrow had a nice game with 17 points on 8-11 shooting, but this did not have a major effect on the game.

Gerald Green finishing an alley-oop. He had a great first half, but, as most Nets were, was invisible in the second half.

As I said in the beginning, this loss is much less bitter because the Bucks are looking to catch the Knicks for the 8 seed in the east, and as a Nets fan, I am happy to give up this victory for the greater cause. And nobody actually expected the Nets to beat the Bucks missing Deron and Lopez. The Nets’ next game will be on Wednesday as The Rock will host the Toronto Raptors. The last time the Nets played the Raptors, they lost by 21 at home in probably their worst effort of the season. I expect a somewhat better effort on Wednesday, and Raphi better hope so because he will be going. I will be getting back late Wednesday night and I hope to attend many games while I am home, starting with a KHH reunion game on Saturday when the Nets face the New Orleans Hornets. Bob’s Cats and Hornets alert: Bob beat the Hornets on the road tonight in probably the most disgusting game I have ever heard of (luckily, I did not see it) 73-71. EWWW. The leading scorers were Gerald Henderson and Jarrett Jack who both had 15 points. That’s right, nobody scored more than 15 points. It was a defensive battle (offensive struggle). Bob managed to get his 6th win of the season despite shooting 0-12 from 3. Our congratulations go out to all of Bob’s Cats!

Chris Kaman attempting to guard Bismack Biyombo. Have you ever seen a more disgusting picture? Because I sure haven't. Maybe it would be more disgusting if Johan Petro was somehow in it. Who knows how to use photoshop?

Knicks-Bucks Recap

Brandon Jennings throwing down one of his many dunks tonight. He killed the Knicks.

Tonight, the Knicks got blown out at the Garden by the Milwaukee Bucks, 100-86. This was a shock to everyone in the MSG crowd, including me. It is fair to say that everyone thought that the Knicks would snap their 4-game losing streak tonight against the Bucks, who came in with a record of 0-8 on the road. Throughout the game, Knicks fans were booing profusely, especially in the second half when the Knicks were simply unable to put the ball in the basket. In the second half, the Knicks only scored 35 points, and this was supposed to be a high-powered offense with Carmelo and Amare. It was far from that on Friday night. First I will talk about the impressive Bucks, then the terrible Knicks, and then the jokes and notes from the game.

Drew Gooden is so disgusting.

The star of the game for Milwaukee was Brandon Jennings. He was pretty incredible tonight, and he looked like an NBA superstar. I thought I was watching Derrick Rose. Jennings came into the game only averaging 18 ppg, but tonight he doubled that with 36. He even made 6 3’s, which is definitely not his strength. In the second half, he took over at times, making 3’s, getting steals, and smashing open break-away dunks. One possible reason he had such a good game was payback for the Knicks not selecting him in the 2009 draft. The Knicks had the number 8 pick, while the Bucks had the 10th. The Knicks picked Jordan Hill, and we all know how that worked out. Every Buck was on their game tonight, even Shaun Livingston (yes, he is still alive), who had a season high 18 points. He also got his first start of the season, taking the place of ex-Bob’s Cat Stephen Jackson, who was benched for the entire game for skipping morning practice. He probably wants to go back to Charlotte right now. And Jackson is probably the Bucks biggest offensive weapon, which makes it even more shocking that the Knicks lost this game by 14 points. Another impressive Buck, was, and I called it, Drew Gooden, who had 10 points and 11 rebounds. He helped the Bucks get many second chance opportunities and is very good at tipping balls to teammates. This is such a KHH thing to be good at. Petro should learn from Gooden.

Carmelo going up for a layup. He probably missed.

On to the Knicks, who were more disgusting than usual tonight. Their biggest problem was easy shots. In the second half, they could have easily scored 50 points if they didn’t miss layups. Literally, layups. Tyson Chandler and Amare Stoudemire were not able to make their layups tonight and it killed the Knicks. It seemed like they were from France, because all they were doing was French Layups. The Knicks did not hit a field goal in the first 6+ minutes of the fourth quarter and there were boos galore. The Knicks’ other major problem is that the bench is non-existent. Actually, the rest of the team other than Carmelo is non-existent, but especially the bench. They scored a grand total of 11 points. Drew Gooden alone scored 10 off the bench. Ew. The Knicks also shot 37% from the field (a very Nets number) and 27% from 3. That’s not going to win you many games. The leader for the Knicks was obviously Carmelo Anthony, who scored 35 points, but it was an extremely ugly 35. To prove this, after the game my sister asked me, “How did Carmelo score 35? He sucked tonight.” Yes, indeed, he sucked. He took 26 shots and only made 11 of them. Most of his shots were when he was double-teamed, and sometimes he got a lucky foul call. He made 11 foul shots, which will really help your scoring numbers. This was such a typical Carmelo performance. He takes 25+ shots, scores 30+ points, and the Knicks get blown out. So typical.

Carmelo was not happy tonight.

Now on to the jokes and notes:

• Carmelo got thrown out of the game in the last two minutes after the game was already over. He got a double-technical called on him earlier in the game, and got another double-tech in between two of his foul shots. This ejected him, which led to an extremely KHH moment. Because he still had 1 shot left when he was ejected, the Bucks got to choose which Knick would get to take the foul shot. I thought they were going to choose Jared Jeffries, a 50% foul shooter, but instead they chose Josh Harrellson, a 57% foul shooter. For those of you who don’t know, Josh Harrellson is a rookie out of Kentucky. He does not look like an NBA player at all. He is extremely white and disgusting-looking. He promptly bricked the free throw to a chorus of boos, and the Bucks won the game. It was a great moment.
  

  Josh Harrellson. Ewwwww.

• Speaking of white people, the Bucks have so many of them. I believe they have 7 of them. On a 15 man roster. Wow.
• The referees seemed to be rooting for the Bucks tonight. Even though I was as well, they made some very bad calls against the Knicks. But it didn’t matter. That might have given the Knicks 5 points back, which wouldn’t have actually made a difference in the game.
• Knicks fans were brutal tonight, as I expected they would be if the Knicks were losing the game. There were even boos in the first half when it was still a close game. In the third quarter, the “Fire D’Antoni” cheers started, and in the fourth, “Let’s Go Giants” was very popular. After Carmelo got ejected, it seemed like the fans were debating which cheer to use, which was very amusing to me. I definitely enjoyed myself, and joined in with both groups.
  

  Knicks Fans

• Because of these Knicks fans, this was not a KHH event. At KHH events, fans don’t really care about the game very much. There are almost never boos and the home team is expected to lose. This was very different. I prefer KHH events.
• As I announced in my preview, I wore my Deron Williams throw away jersey to the game today. I was not heckled nearly as much as I expected I would be, but I definitely got a few strange looks. I was rooting very loudly for the Bucks the entire game (I did not see a single fan for another NBA team, let alone the Bucks at the game), and I was standing and cheering when Brandon Jennings was hitting his 3’s in the fourth quarter. In some ways, I wish I was booed more, but I think I still got the point across that I was attempting to convert Knicks fans into Nets fans.

This was my last event, KHH or not KHH, before I go back to Colorado. The Nets will be playing at home against the Thunder tomorrow where I expect them to be blown out (110-89 is my prediction), but I will not be able to watch because I will be on a plane. It will be up to Raphi to provide a recap for our avid readers, and me. I will try to continue to blog during my time in college, and I will definitely keep up with the Nets.

I expect to see many Durant slams tomorrow.