After suffering a 136-117 loss at Charlotte two nights earlier - when Thomas and Porter were a combined minus-38 and were embarrassingly bad defensively - Fernandez demanded more from them. On Friday, against a much better Cavaliers team that had the best record in the Eastern Conference last season, the Nets stepped up their game. Thomas had 33 points and nine assists, one shy of his career-high, while Porter added 31 and eight rebounds.
"I'm still not over it," Reznick, 89, told the Daily News. "I was there for 26 hours, and I felt like I was there for a week. You have no idea what they did for us and how they treated us. All the stars were there. It was unbelievable, absolutely wonderful."