ATLANTA — In a back-and-forth between Brooklyn’s Mikal Bridges and Atlanta’s Trae Young, the Hawks star got the last word. And the win.
Bridges carried the Nets back from a huge double-digit deficit and a late fourth-quarter hole.
But Young got help in their duel when Bridges got blocked at the rim by Onyeka Okongwu in the waning moments of overtime, and Brooklyn suffered a 147-145 loss to Atlanta before a sellout crowd of 17,340 at State Farm Arena.
It was a third straight loss for the Nets (6-8) and the second in a row in Atlanta under crushing circumstances.
Young, who burned Brooklyn on a buzzer-beater last season, poured in a team-high 43 points, shooting 8-of-16 from behind the arc.
Bridges had a game-high 45 points and 10 rebounds. But he’ll rue the two points he didn’t get.
After Bridges carried them through regulation and hit the first bucket of overtime, Young knotted it with a mid-range jumper.
Dejounte Murray’s layup and a Young 3-pointer left the Nets in a 138-133 hole.
But Bridges drilled a 3-pointer off a Spencer Dinwiddie feed, then Dinwiddie (26 points, 12 rebounds) pulled the Nets ahead on an and-one with two minutes left in overtime.
Bridges’ fadeaway made it 141-140, but Young gave the Hawks the lead with 45.9 seconds remaining.
That’s when Bridges answered again.
His 12-footer rolled around the rim once, nearly fell out, orbited a second time and fell through.
The Nets star trotted back up court with a 143-142 lead and sent Atlanta into a timeout with 26 seconds left.
But Brooklyn couldn’t stop Young, his 19-footer putting the Hawks back ahead with 18 seconds left.
And when Bridges got blocked at the rim by Okongwu, Young sank one of two free throws with 2.2 seconds left for a two-point lead.
But the Nets, after a timeout to advance to the front court, couldn’t get the ball into Bridges, with Lonnie Walker IV getting the last shot, which was off target.
“They play fast. They got talent with Trae, Dejounte, and I can name everybody on that team,” Bridges said before the game. “They’re just really talented. They got Quin [Snyder] as a coach, a really good coach. So they’re gonna be locked in, even off the back-to- back.
“They got hoopers everywhere. They are thinking about bringing my boy, Saddiq [Bey] off the bench. It’s crazy.”
Last season, the Nets lost a buzzer-beater in Atlanta when Dinwiddie was afraid of being whistled for a foul on Young and the Hawks superstar drilled a mid-range shot that replay confirmed beat the horn.
This time, he contested Young with Brooklyn clinging to a 131-130 edge with just one second left in regulation — after Cam Johnson’s putback of a Bridges miss with 3.1 seconds left — and sure enough the Hawks star got the call.
But Young missed the first, and a chance to give Atlanta the win. His second forced overtime.
“Just reminded me about that. We definitely owe them,” Nic Claxton said before the game. “And that was with the new team, too. So we’ve got to come out and get some revenge.”
Facing a Hawks team coming off a draining 157-152 marathon against Indiana a night earlier, it was Brooklyn that looked a step slow early. It fell behind by 15 early, but rallied to take a one-point edge midway through the fourth quarter.
The Nets quickly coughed up a 9-0 run to trail by eight. But down 128-124 with 1:42 left in regulation, they closed on a 7-3 run to force overtime.
“Obviously the head of the snake is Trae Young. They put up what, 150 points [Tuesday] night. Any team that could do that, you’ve got to come out and be sound,” Claxton said. “We’ve had some battles with him in the past, some real good games so we’re looking forward to it.
“His basketball IQ, his feel for the game, it’s just off the charts. He’s not the tallest guy, not the strongest guy. But he just knows how to play the game, knows how to draw fouls. Just a smart basketball player, so you got to be real smart against him to make sure you’re not fouling. He’s always a threat out there.”
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