National Basketball Association

Nets earn third win of season

Published Dec. 30, 2009 12:00 a.m. ET

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Brook Lopez had 21 points and 14 rebounds and the New Jersey Nets not only posted a rare victory, they snapped a 10-game losing streak with a 104-95 blowout of the New York Knicks on Wednesday night.

Yi Jianlian added 22 points, Chris Douglas-Roberts had 17 and Devin Harris had 17, eight assists and seven rebounds as New Jersey (3-29) ended its second double-digit losing streak of the season.

The Nets set an NBA record opening the season with 18 straight losses.

Reserve Al Harrington scored 25 to lead the Knicks, who failed in their bid for their first 10-win month since January 2003. David Lee added 24 points and 15 rebounds for New York, which also saw its streak of holding opponents under 100 points end at 11 games.

With the return of Douglas-Roberts to the starting lineup, this marked the first time since the second game of the season that New Jersey had its opening-day lineup on the court.

It showed against the Knicks, who were playing the second of back-to-back games.

The last time the Nets played the Knicks on Dec. 6, they scored a season-high 61 points in the first half, and then got blown out in the second half.

This time, they put up 60 points, shot 62 percent from the field and took a 60-53 halftime lead. Then, they didn't stop in the third quarter, opening with a 12-2 spurt to push the lead 72-55 on a dunk by Lopez, who had nine points and nine rebounds in the quarter.

The Knicks had their chances in the fourth quarter when the Nets only made six baskets, but they also struggled - hitting nine baskets while turning the ball over seven times.

The closest the Knicks got was eight points, all in the final minute.

New Jersey, which shot 60 percent for the game, took control midway through the second quarter, hitting nine straight shots from the field to open a 57-44 lead. Yi had three baskets in the run and Douglas-Roberts two, the last on a fastbreak layup.

Lee kept the Knicks close, scoring eight of his 16 first-half points including a layup in the final second of the half.

NOTES: Chris Duhon hit nothing but net on his first 3 3-point attempts and then hit nothing on his fourth. He finished with 12 points. ... Jared Jeffries had a bad night with the officials. He had five fouls, a technical and no free throws. ... The Knicks were called for two defensive three-seconds technicals. Yi made both shots and the one on the technical against Jeffries. ...The Nets only got 10 points from their bench, seven by Keyon Dooling.