Faced with a gradual backward situation, Coach Johnson made a quick decision and sent 39-year-old Stackhouse and 33-year-old Bogans again.

At this time, the Brooklyn Nets' lineup became center Lopez, power forward Wallace, small forward Bogans, scoring guard Gao Dazhuang, and point guard Starkerhouse.

The introduction of the two veterans paid off immediately, not only did they seize the few opportunities in attack, but they also relied on their veteran experience to confront the opposing youngsters defensively.

As his teammates gradually regained their touch, Tall and Strong began to gradually reduce the number of shots.

In the first quarter, he scored 13 points on 5-of-9 shooting, and in the entire second quarter, he scored only four points, but the Nets, led by Tall Strong, regained their offensive feel and got rid of the disadvantage at the beginning of the first quarter.

But in the second half, the situation deteriorated again.

Because of the appearance of Stackhouse and Bogans, the Nets are at an absolute disadvantage in terms of height on the court, especially Wallace, who was temporarily pushed to the power forward position, and it is obviously difficult to face the opponent's David West's ferocious offense.

Compared with the Pacers' interior combination of Hibbert and West, the Nets' Wallace and Lopez's interior line is at a disadvantage both offensively and defensively, especially on defense, the Nets basically have no second rebounds, Hibbert completely suppressed Lopez, and Wallace was also pinned down by West.

At this time, it was the tall and strong who stepped forward, and he first gave full play to his advantage of strong breakthrough ability in the attack, and frequently entered the inside line. Create a situation where there are more local fights and fewer fights.

Defensively, Tall and Strong always pays attention to shrinking the defense, and never hesitates when the foul is committed, which relieves the pressure on the team's interior line.

But the good times didn't last long, and when there were 3 minutes and 26 seconds left in the third quarter, an accident suddenly happened.

In the Nets' offense, the tall and strong one suddenly accelerated and forced through Paul George's block, but when the tall and strong just stepped into the paint area, he was tripped by Stephenson, who was moving sideways to make up for the defense.

"Peng" sounded. The tall and strong man flew out sideways. and slammed to the floor.

Without hesitation, the referee blew for a defensive foul on Stephenson.

"It's okay," at this time, the Nets' team doctor, Wallace, Stackhouse and other teams immediately surrounded him worriedly.

"It's okay, it's okay," the tall man jumped to the Nets' layout area with Wallace's support, unlaced his shoelaces and checked his ankle, which looked like a sprained left ankle.

However, after a brief exchange with Coach Johnson. Gao Dazhuang did not choose to rest. Instead, keep fighting. It seems that his ankle is fine.

Just 1 minute after the foot of the foot, there was a "brush", and the tall and strong first hit a 3-pointer in the bottom corner after receiving a pass from Stackhouse. Then when the Pacers were attacking with the ball, he flew and fanned Stephens' layup.

This offense and defense, tall and strong proved themselves with practical actions, and also greatly improved the morale of the team.

This ankle sprain was like a catalyst that made Gao Dazhuang even braver.

In the fourth quarter of the game, the Pacers tried to pull away the score several times, but they were all bitten by Gao Dazhuang, but in order to stop the Pacers' offense, Gao Dazhuang also paid the price of several fouls.

"Da Zhuang, pay attention, you have already committed 4 fouls" Just when the Nets coach Johnson reminded Gao Dazhuang loudly on the sidelines, Gao Dazhuang was blown a defensive foul by the referee again.

Because just now, the tall and strong stepped on Stephenson while covering for Stackhouse, so he was whistled by the referee for his fifth personal foul in the game.

"Cut" in response to the referee's decision, the Barclays Center Arena immediately resounded with a huge boo, just now this decision is indeed a bit far-fetched, but the tall and strong action also has some revenge for Stephenson's stumbling in the third quarter.

Despite the overall strength of the Indiana Pacers, the Nets also clung to the score amid the cheers of the home fans.

"When" Pacers point guard Lance Stephenson misses a shot, but Roy Hibbert grabs a crucial rebound above Nets center Lopez.

After winning the rebound, Hibbert didn't stop, relying on Lopez to make a direct layup.

However, at the moment when the ball was shot, there was a "snap", and I saw the tall and strong attack from behind him, and the heavy palm directly fanned the ball out of the bottom line.

"Toot" at this time the referee's whistle sounded again.

"What?" Gao Dazhuang raised his hands and looked at the referee in surprise, but the referee mercilessly gave Gao Dazhuang a defensive foul.

Although Coach Johnson and the Nets players immediately surrounded the referees, they still failed to change the referee's decision, and Coach Johnson was also whistled by the "iron mask" referee for a technical foul.

There were 4 minutes and 48 seconds left in the fourth quarter of the game, Gao Dazhuang was whistled by the referee for his sixth foul and could only leave the court early.

After losing the tall and strong, the Nets' final counterattack failed to succeed, and they could only accept the fate of losing at home.

97：86

The Indiana Pacers showed their fine form once again as they cemented their third-place spot in the East with an away win over the Brooklyn Nets, who have been underperforming lately.

And after losing this game, the Nets not only turned the gap with the Pacers into a full 2 wins, but also had to be careful of the Atlanta Hawks behind them.

Although Gao Dazhuang was fouled in the fourth quarter, he shot 10-of-22 from the field and 7-of-7 from the free-throw line to finish with 31 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assists.

However, Gao Dazhuang still failed to lead the Nets to defend their home court.

After the game, Prokhorov did not leave the arena immediately as usual, but walked into the Nets coach's office, and the two had a secret meeting in it for nearly half an hour, and because of this, Coach Johnson's post-game press conference was much later than usual.

When the Nets' locker room opened after the game, Coach Johnson's office, the one on the left-hand side of the locker room door, was ajar, and Coach Johnson had gone to the press room.

But the team owner Prokhorov has not left after chatting, his face is flushed so much that he looks like he has been angry, Prokhorov and Nets assistant coach P.J. Kalesimo are still yelling something, holding the technical statistics of the game in his hand, following his hand to wave vigorously, it can be seen that Prokhorov is exerting pressure on the Nets coaching staff.

The Nets' loss was not unexpected, and the reason for their loss was expected, with the New York Times commenting after the game: "Not surprising! The Nets rebounded again! ”

Looking at the 38-57 rebounds between the Brooklyn Nets and the Indiana Pacers on the technical statistics table, it's not hard to see why the Nets lost this game.

In his post-match press conference, Coach Johnson said the team had to really take this long-standing issue seriously, otherwise it would be very difficult to win.

In fact, the Nets did a decent job on the defensive end of the game other than rebounding, keeping the Pacers shooting at 39 percent.

However, while the Pacers missed a lot of shots, their 22 frontcourt rebounds allowed them to get a lot of re-offensive opportunities, and ultimately relied on that advantage to take the Nets down.

"We had a chance to win this game, and our defense put a lot of pressure on them and made their shots very shaky," Nets coach Johnson said in an interview with the media at the press conference, "but they took too many rebounds, which gave them more shots, and you know, they're the third team in the East, and when they shoot 20 more shots than us, it's hard for us to win."

In this game, the Pacers made a total of 94 shots, while the Nets only made 69 shots.

"Every one of us really wants to grab the rebound, and each of us understands the importance of rebounding, but when it comes time to grab the rebound, we always don't do it" This time, even the team's center Lopez, who usually doesn't deal with reporters much, also stood up and answered reporters' questions head-on, "We have been pushed to the edge of the cliff on this issue, we have to respond, otherwise, the opponent will use this time and again to hit us, like the Pacers did today."

Lopez scored 17 points but only had three rebounds, and his weakness in rebounding made the Nets' interior defense look weak.

"Losing to an opponent like the Pacers makes me very unhappy," Gao Dazhuang also spoke to reporters after the game, "This is not our real level, we can do better."

Gao Dazhuang also said that the Nets have long understood the team's disadvantages in rebounding, and have also studied solutions internally, and everyone said that they would do their best to grab rebounds, but it was not so easy to do in the game.

In response to Lopez's only 3 rebounds, the tall man said: "He wasn't really good enough on the defensive end tonight, but everybody's going to get up and down, he's a guy with a lot of self-esteem, and I'm sure he'll respond in the next game."

"We want to win, in order to achieve our goal, we have to grab rebounds" Contrary to Lopez, Gerald Wallace, who is only 2.01 meters tall, grabbed 10 rebounds in this game, he told reporters after the game: "It must be admitted that in the fourth quarter, we have an objective disadvantage in terms of height, which increases our difficulty in grabbing rebounds, but grabbing rebounds is a very complex technique, and it is not completely determined by height, even if we can't grab more rebounds than our opponents in every game, We should also try to narrow the gap between them." (To be continued......)

PS: Nets haven't been doing well lately and have to be traded :)