This was before the Brooklyn Nets went into Philadelphia on Thursday night with Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving and annihilated Joel Embiid, James Harden and the 76ers.
Instead, it was a debate two nights earlier on the same network that carried Nets-76ers, when WNBA star Candace Parker and former Miami Heat teammates Shaquille O’Neal and Dwyane Wade were debating the reality of the Heat finishing as the No. 1 playoff seed in the Eastern Conference only to possibly face the Nets in the first round.
It is a prospect that looms if the Nets finish No. 8 in the East, which is a distinct eventuality: Brooklyn loses the opening game of the play-in tournament and then wins the second.
