MEMPHIS — The Nets had to play without their leading scorer Saturday, as Michael Porter Jr. sat on the bench in street clothes.
Brooklyn missed his offense in the worst way, falling behind early and never recovering in a 129-110 loss to Memphis before a crowd of 15,103 at FedEx Forum.
Porter wasn’t injured, but was a healthy scratch for personal reasons. Initially listed as questionable, the veteran forward was ruled out an hour before tipoff.
The Nets offered no update on their top scorer or his timetable.
“No, not yet. A personal situation came up as we were coming to the arena. So that’s why it was announced late,” Brooklyn coach Jordi Fernández said. “We don’t have any more information right now.”
Porter was notably on the bench watching his team play. What he saw was the Nets stumble badly right out of the gate, already trailing 35-17 with 2:47 left in the first quarter after a Cam Spencer 3-pointer.
After Brooklyn had clawed within eight — Julius Randle’s 3-pointer pulled them within 85-77 with 5:12 left in the third quarter — they got no closer.
A Randle turnover killed the brittle Brooklyn momentum, and it quickly swung back the other way. The Nets coughed up a 16-1 run, with a Taylor Hendricks dunk putting them in a 101-78 hole with 40 seconds left in the third.
The Nets didn’t have a rally in them in the fourth, falling behind by 26 after a Javon Small 3-pointer with 7:08 to play.
Randle finished with a team-high 22 points and five assists, but had just four rebounds and was a minus-18. Sharpe had a double-double with 16 points, 11 boards and five dimes, while rookie lottery pick Mikel Brown Jr. — who’d been out with an illness and hadn’t played since Nov. 7 — returned and logged 19 minutes.
Memphis’ Cedrick Coward had a game-high 23 points, while Hendricks added 22 for a Grizzlies team that didn’t even have leading scorer Ty Jerome.
Turns out they didn’t need him. The Nets weren’t good enough to take advantage of his missing 25 points per game.
It was a galling way to end the four-game road swing. And an odd one.
Porter leads the Nets in scoring at 21.5 points per game, and while not always a seamless partner for Randle, has provided a potent 1-2 punch and a steadying force for them to build their offense around.
The Nets had gradually gone from too much Randle iso-ball in the earlier stages of the season to running DHOs with Porter and Day’Ron Sharpe, and looking more cohesive and efficient.
But that cohesion and efficiency went missing Saturday night. Or, at least, it was on the bench in street clothes, unusual for a player out for personal reasons.
Bereft of Porter, Fernández handed Noah Clowney the start at small forward.
With Randle, Sharpe, Egor Dëmin and Danny Wolf being deployed as a jumbo two-guard, every Brooklyn starter was at least 6-foot-9 or taller, just as they had been in the blowout win in New Orleans three nights earlier.
This was the first time any NBA team had started a lineup of players all 6-foot-9 or taller since the Los Angeles Lakers had done so April 21, 1990.
“Yeah, I think it helps,” Fernández had said beforehand of the jumbo lineup. “I mean, you think about Danny at the quote-unquote two, but obviously his versatility of shooting, being able to playmake, also a big body defensively that can rebound. All those things are important. Let’s see how we keep evolving.”
They devolved Saturday. Though part of that might have been having their travel plans from New Orleans thrown awry, far more of it was missing Porter.