Nets at Wizards
It’s just about over for the Washington Wizards, though nothing is final until the “e” gets put next to the team name in the conference standings. The Wizards will try to stave off elimination from the postseason when they host the Brooklyn Nets on Wednesday.
Washington has dropped five of its last seven games to fall from a battle for a playoff spot to the brink of elimination with five games left in the regular season and would need to win out and get the help of a historic collapse from one of the teams above it in the standings to still have a chance. The Wizards just completed a 2-3 road trip – with the wins coming over the lowly Los Angeles Lakers and Phoenix Suns – and are not happy about the way they have played of late. “We got a lot of things to improve on,” Washington guard Bradley Beal told reporters. “Hopefully we get all five of these (remaining games). It’s definitely disappointing. We wanted to get more than what we got coming out here. We got to put this behind us and move on.” The Nets have seemingly been out of the playoff race all season and have dropped five straight games by an average of 19.6 points.
TV: 7 p.m. ET, YES (Brooklyn), CSN Mid-Atlantic (Washington)
ABOUT THE NETS (21-56): Brooklyn decided over the weekend to shut down the veteran frontcourt pair of Thaddeus Young and Brook Lopez in order to avoid injuries in meaningless games and get a look at some of the other players on the roster. “I wish we were more successful as a team, obviously,” Lopez told ESPN.com. “I think we could’ve been better. It takes time obviously to figure things out, but I think we could’ve figured things out quicker. And I think our young guys learned a lot this season, and we found a lot of tools we could use going forward, definitely.” The absence of Young and Lopez is a good thing for power forward Thomas Robinson, who has logged four straight double-doubles.
ABOUT THE WIZARDS (37-40): Washington fell to the Sacramento Kings earlier in the trip and came out flat on Sunday before falling at the Los Angeles Clippers 114-109. “I’m on to Brooklyn on Wednesday,” Wizards coach Randy Wittman told reporters. “This road trip’s over. We got five games in eight days and we got to worry about the first one. That’s all I want (the players) thinking.” Beal, who had been critical of the team’s effort earlier in the trip, went 2-of-16 from the field on Sunday and shot 34.7 percent during the five games, including 7-of-28 from 3-point range.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Wizards All-Star PG John Wall is 22-of-64 from the field in the last four games.
2. Nets PG Donald Sloan (illness) sat out Sunday’s loss to New Orleans and is day-to-day.
3. Washington earned a 111-96 win at Brooklyn on Dec. 26 and will face the Nets twice in the last five games.