With wins hard to come by this season, the New Jersey Nets missed another opportunity to put one in the win column.
The Nets trailed for the majority of the night and instant replay sealed their fate in a 103-99 loss at The Izod Center.
With 27 second remaining and the T'Wolves leading, 99-97, they inbounded the ball and Courtney Lee appeared to swat it off the Minnesota player. During a Nets' timeout, the referees huddled and reviewed the play with instant replay. After initially awarding the ball to the Nets, the referees overturned the call, thus turning the final 27 seconds into a free-throw shooting contest.
Corey Brewer and Damien Wilkins were perfect from the charity stripe and the Nets, down four, failed to get a shot off in the final 16.5 seconds.
Minnesota moved to 6-24 on the season and extended New Jersey's slide to eight games. The Nets are now 2-27 on the year.
New Jersey dropped the season opener to Minnesota in a game in which the Nets led by 14 points after three quarters. The T'Wolves won that game despite the absence of forward Kevin Love.
Kiki Vandeweghe said his presence has made Minnesota a considerably better team than its record indicates.
"This team, I know that they do not have a good record, but this team has played significantly better since Kevin Love has come back," Vandeweghe said. "They're playing with some confidence and bottom line is they hit shots when they needed to and we did not."
The Nets trailed by as many as 11 points in the fourth quarter, but three three-pointers catapulted New Jersey back into the game. Courtney Lee hit a corner three to cut Minnesota's lead to 97-96 with 1:02 left in the game.
Corey Brewer responded with a floater in the lane to extend the T'Wolves' lead to 99-96. Following a Brook Lopez free-throw, the deciding call-reversal occurred.
Keyon Dooling and Courtney Lee had no problem with the call because instant replay is in place to get the call right.
"We would've liked to have had the call, but they put the instant replay system in to get calls right," Dooling said. "So they made the right call. If the replay showed it was the right call then they made the right call."
"The call went our way for a second so we [were] going to go with it," Lee said. "Once they reviewed it I looked at Devin and said, 'It's going to be their ball.' I mean, the refs did a good job with reviewing it and making the right call."
Love's lay-up with 8:03 left in the first quarter gave Minnesota an 11-10 lead. The T'Wolved led the rest of the way.
All five Minnesota starters scored in double digits, and Al Jefferson paved the way for the T'Wolves. The center scored 27 points and grabbed seven rebounds. Love, who has 11 double-doubles since returning from a fractured hand, scored 13 points and hauled in 16 rebounds.
Jefferson outscored his counterpart, Brook Lopez. Although Lopez had 10 rebounds and seven assists, he scored just nine points. The match-up was a stark comparison from opening night when Lopez scored 27 points and grabbed 15 rebounds against Jefferson. Jefferson, on the other hand, went 2-of-9 from the field and scored nine points.
"I did a poor job of defending the rim," Lopez said. "It was tough. They did a pretty good job, and I didn't step up and [meet] the challenge.
"[Jefferson] just got good positioning," Lopez added. "He moved without the ball well, getting positioning, you know, flashing and finishing."
For the Nets, Devin Harris tallied a team-high 23 points. Yi Jianlian, returning from a Nov. 4 knee injury, scored 22 points in 30 minutes. Lee and Dooling added 20 and 12 points, respectively. Harris' counterpart, Jonny Flynn, poured in 22 points.
Yi's return from a long layoff provides the Nets' with a versatile option that can score inside as well as outside.
"Any time we've got a guy that can space the floor the way that he does and stretch it with a lot of screen-and-rolls that I'm running... it stretches the defense," Harris said. "That's what we look for him to do and he's doing a good job of it."
Although Lopez struggled tonight, Harris believes Yi's presence could open up the floor underneath the basket.
"With him and Jarvis and [Keyon Dooling], we've got our three-point shooters back," Harris said. "All it does is open up the middle for myself as well as Brook. It will take some of those double-teams to be a little bit later because they're worried about Yi shooting that top of the key three."
The Nets trailed, 50-39, late in the second quarter but utilized a 9-2 run to close out the half. The Nets were behind, 52-48, at the half and 76-74 after the third quarter. Minnesota opened up the third and fourth quarters on runs, however.
Jarvis Hayes and Chris Douglas-Roberts are both expected back next week. Hayes has been sidelined since an early-season injury in a loss to Washington while Douglas-Roberts sprained his ankle in a loss to the Lakers.
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