Before Wednesday’s loss to the Sacramento Kings, Kenny Atkinson lamented about recent slow starts put together by his Brooklyn Nets.
The second-year head coach wanted a better effort from his starting line-up to begin the game, one through five, and as the numbers show, it was anything but.
By the end of the first, the Nets had given up 36 points to the Kings on 80% shooting, scoring only 20 points of their own on under 30% from the field. After trailing by as many as 21 in the second, the Nets eventually made their way back, losing 104-99, but expended a ton of energy just to narrow the deficit over the remainder of regulation.