WASHINGTON, D.C. ? The Washington Wizards wanted to win this one for coach Eddie Jordan.
Jordan was back on the sidelines for the Wizards after missing two games recovering from a blood clot in his left leg that hospitalized him on Thanksgiving, and Washington beat his former team, the New Jersey Nets, 95-68 on Wednesday night.
“It’s great having him back,” said Gilbert Arenas, who had a season-high 30 points, seven rebounds and five assists to lead the Wizards to their fifth victory in six games.
Jordan missed the Wizards’ 116-114 overtime loss Friday at Philadelphia and a 114-109 overtime victory Sunday at Toronto.
“We tried our best to get two wins while he was away, but we could only get one,” Arenas said.
Even with a 22-point, fourth-quarter lead, Jordan said he never felt comfortable until the final horn sounded in the Nets’ sixth consecutive road loss.
“You saw that we had our two starting guards in there until the last minute and a half,” Jordan said. “I wasn’t comfortable, I really wasn’t. Our bench played up to a certain point and then I put our (starting) guys back in to close it out.”
The way New Jersey was playing, it probably wouldn’t have mattered. The Nets made a franchise-low 20 of 64 field-goal attempts (31 percent) and 27 of 45 free throws (60 percent). They also tied their franchise low with seven assists. The Nets’ 68 points were the third-lowest amount the Wizards have allowed in franchise history.
“That’s not the kind of performance we expect from ourselves,” Nets coach Lawrence Frank said. “I don’t know what to say. Obviously, we got what we deserved tonight.”
Antawn Jamison added 18 points and nine rebounds as Washington posted its largest winning margin of the season. Larry Hughes had 15 points and nine rebounds.
Eric Williams led New Jersey with 17 points, and Travis Best added 16.
“Tonight we just didn’t have it,” Jason Collins said. “We still have a lot of things on this team that we need to fix.”
The Wizards also welcomed back forward Kwame Brown, who played for the first time this season after having surgery Aug. 3 to repair a broken bone in his right foot. His first jumper of the season gave the Wizards a 57-42 lead with 8:28 remaining in the third quarter.
Brown opened the fourth quarter with back-to-back buckets and finished with six points and two rebounds in 14 minutes before being ejected, along with New Jersey’s Collins, for an altercation with 6:48 left in the game.
“He looked sharp at some points of the game,” Jordan said of Brown. “You can see him still have a little bit of a limp because mentally he is still favoring the leg. I want him to be active. I want him to be our first post-up option, to get his legs under him and earn more minutes.”
Reserve Anthony Peeler scored seven straight points early in the fourth quarter to keep Washington comfortably ahead.
Arenas scored seven points in the Wizards’ 11-3 run as they took an 18-12 lead late in the first quarter.
New Jersey took a 7-0 lead while the Wizards missed their first five shots.
Notes: The Nets lost Zoran Planinic with six minutes remaining in the second quarter with a broken left hand. Nenad Kristic also went to the locker room after injuring his right knee with 1:49 left. After the game, Kristic said he was OK. … The Nets’ 39 first-half points matched the season-low the Wizards have allowed in a half.
