True rivalries are built on high-stakes, competitive games, and with both the Nets and the Knicks under .500 and in rebuilding modes, Friday’s contest isn’t that.
“We’re just in the same state, so to speak. Other than that, I don’t think it’s much more Knicks and Nets,’’ Nets swingman Joe Johnson said. “Probably the first year when we came to Brooklyn [2012] it was a big deal — both teams were respectably pretty good. But … since then it hasn’t really been hyped up like it was that first year.
“Yeah, I mean both teams would probably have to be somewhere at the top of the East.