Most teams that head to China during the preseason suffer a hangover to start the regular season. And the Nets definitely looked three sheets to the wind in their final tune-up.
After sweeping LeBron James and the Lakers in a pair of preseason games in Shanghai and Shenzhen, the Nets came back to Brooklyn and got drilled 123-107 by the defending champion Raptors on Friday night.
The game essentially marked Kyrie Irving’s Nets debut, with the All-NBA guard coming back from a facial injury suffered at the start of the first game in China to score a game-high 19 points in a team-high 25 minutes, trying to jump-start some cohesion.