Nets Notebook: Forcing turnovers and shooting more 3s are team’s goals post All-Star break

The first thing head coach Jacque Vaughn wants to see from his Nets in the second leg of the season is to establish a defensive identity.

Speaking to reporters on a Zoom conference call from the Nets’ practice facility in Industry City, Vaughn, who received a contract extension expected to last through the 2026-27 season on Tuesday, said he wants his team to lean on its biggest strength.

“Our roster is situated where that starting five really can take advantage of doing different things defensively, and so if there’s a bullet point under that defensive piece, it is how can we turn teams over more?” Vaughn said. “I think we can be a Top 10 defensive team if we take that step of turning teams over; so a great challenge for us that way, and that’s going to come from some non-traditional ways.

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“You know me, I’m very curious and I don’t mind taking risks. And so is that going to be going into different games with different game plans in order to get us to have an identity of really stirring things up and being agitators on the defensive end of floor?”

The Nets currently force an average of 13.7 turnovers per game, ranking 20th in the NBA in the category. They rank just 28th in opponent turnovers in the four games they’ve played after the Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant trades. Given the influx of length and defensive capability into the starting lineup, that number is expected to increase significantly.

As for the offense, Vaughn wants to pick up where he left off after the pair of seismic trades that all but destroyed the Nets’ offensive identity.

“The offensive piece is can we play with an extreme amount of pace and transition? And so that’s increasing our transition attempts and threes, that’s our kick-aheads, that’s our potential assists,” he said. “So a lot of bullet points underneath that, just because we don’t have the shot creators like we used to. So we’ve got to be smart in the way we play on the offensive in the floor.”

The Nets enter the second half of the season Top 7 in both three-point attempts and makes in their last four games. The Boston Celtics, however, lead the NBA during that stretch, attempting 50.3 triples per game and netting an average of 21 of those attempts. To replace the isolation scoring gifts both Durant and Irving possess, the Nets will need their three-point volume to trend closer to Boston.

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In their last four games, the Nets averaged 39 three-point attempts and about 15 makes.

Lastly, Vaughn says he wants his team to continue to give everything they have in every minute they play.

“Overall, we have to be the hardest playing team in the league,” he said. “And so when you look at us on film, when you look at us live, when you look at the first possession of the game, are the Brooklyn Nets the hardest playing team in the NBA? And so those are our three areas that we’re really going to lean into in these last 24 games.”

Vaughn said filling the team’s final open roster spot is “not at the top of our priority list.”

Vaughn said in his conversations with general manager Sean Marks, it became clear that “we will continue to keep our eyes open to see if something makes sense, but what we don’t want is someone that’s gonna detract from the culture in the locker room. That’s the biggest piece of that thing.”

Vaughn also said the team needs to play more games before a determination can be made about what they may need to add. The deadline for a team to sign a free agent eligible to play in the playoffs is March 1.

“We’ll keep our eyes open but that isn’t the number one priority right now.”

Jacque Vaughn said he doesn’t envision Mikal Bridges scoring 45 points every night like he did when he set a new career high in Brooklyn’s victory over the Miami Heat entering the All-Star break.

That said, Bridges is now the best player in Brooklyn and has proven he can shoulder a heavier offensive load.

“I think that’s a part of growing together a little bit. I envision one of these dudes being an All-Star on this team, one of these dudes being defensive first or second team, growing that way,” he said. “I don’t anticipate Mikal having 45 every game, so that piece I’ll acknowledge, but to see his game grow, to play pick and roll, to be able to take someone off the bounce, to offensive rebound, to be able to push in transition, all those things, we’re definitely going to tap into, but at the same time, trying to win games while we’re doing that.

“So that’s where you find yourself where you want guys to be comfortable to take risks and be curious and be interested, but at the same time, we’ve gotta win games going forward.”

Vaughn said the Nets have already begun integrating some sets Bridges ran with the Suns in Brooklyn, but also said the Nets will run some of the same plays they ran for Durant to get Bridges good looks, specifically pin down screens to get Bridges free in the mid-range.

“When K was here, we had that similar pindown, Nic [Claxton] would go get Kevin, but we started at a different angle,” he said. “Just looking at some of the Phoenix stuff and to get Mikal a little bit more freedom, we moved it up to the elbow, and then kinda playing out of that. Actually that will be a part of us going forward and we’ll kinda grow from there a little bit.

“Really think Spencer, Mikal, and Nic can have some more synergy and grow together whether that ends up being double drag in the middle of the floor, whether there is some stack pick and roll, we’ll use [Cam Johnson] in that also because of his ability to shoot, so you’ll start seeing us flare a little bit.

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“So we’re gonna grow from there, we’ll probably have three or four quintessential sets that you’ll see us live out of. That elbow will be a piece of that. But yeah, watching some film and getting some input from Mikal and C.J., that’s definitely an area that we’ll continue to grow in.”