1992–93 New Jersey Nets season

Off-season

During the off-season, the Nets hired Chuck Daly as their new head coach; Daly led the Detroit Pistons to two consecutive NBA championships between 1989 and 1990.^[2][3][4] The team also acquired Rumeal Robinson from the Atlanta Hawks,^[5][6][7] acquired Jayson Williams from the Philadelphia 76ers,^[8][9] and signed free agents Chucky Brown and Rick Mahorn.^[10][11]

Regular season

Under Daly and with the addition of Robinson, the Nets struggled with a 4–7 start to the regular season, but then posted a six-game winning streak between November and December afterwards, and later on held a 30–21 record at the All-Star break.^[12] However, the team lost second-year star Kenny Anderson for the remainder of the season due to a wrist injury after 55 games.^[13][14][15] At mid-season, the team signed free agents, former All-Star guard Maurice Cheeks,^[16][17][18] and former All-Star forward Bernard King.^[19][20][21] Despite losing ten of their final eleven games of the season, which included a seven-game losing streak in April, the Nets finished in third place in the Atlantic Division with a 43–39 record, and earned the sixth seed in the Eastern Conference; it was the team's first winning season above .500 in winning percentage since the 1983–84 season.^[22]

Dražen Petrović averaged 22.3 points, 3.5 assists and 1.3 steals per game, while Derrick Coleman averaged 20.7 points, 11.2 rebounds, 3.6 assists and 1.7 blocks per game, and Anderson showed improvement becoming the Nets' starting point guard, as he provided the team with 16.9 points, 8.2 assists and 1.7 steals per game. In addition, Chris Morris contributed 14.1 points, 5.9 rebounds and 1.9 steals per game, while Sam Bowie provided with 9.1 points, 7.0 rebounds and 1.6 blocks per game, and Robinson contributed 8.4 points, 4.0 assists and 1.2 steals per game. Off the bench, King avareged 7.0 points per game in 32 games, while Rafael Addison contributed 6.3 points per game, Brown provided with 5.1 points and 3.0 rebounds per game, Mahorn averaged 3.9 points and 3.8 rebounds per game, Cheeks contributed 3.6 points and 3.1 assists per game in 35 games, and Chris Dudley provided with 3.5 points, 7.2 rebounds and 1.5 blocks per game.^[23]

Petrović and Coleman were both named to the All-NBA Third Team, while Anderson finished in third place in Most Improved Player voting, with Coleman and Petrović both finishing in eighth and tied in eleventh place respectively,^[24][25] and Daly finished in fifth place in Coach of the Year voting.^[26][25] Despite stellar seasons, neither Petrović, Coleman or Anderson were selected for the 1993 NBA All-Star Game in Salt Lake City, Utah.^[27][28] The Nets finished 15th in the NBA in home-game attendance, with an attendance of 620,416 at the Brendan Byrne Arena during the regular season.^[23][29]

NBA playoffs

In the Eastern Conference First Round of the 1993 NBA playoffs, and for the second consecutive year, the Nets faced off against the 3rd–seeded Cleveland Cavaliers, who were led by the All-Star trio of Brad Daugherty, Mark Price and Larry Nance. With Anderson out due to his season-ending wrist injury, the Nets used Robinson as their starting point guard in his absence. The Cavaliers took a 2–1 series lead before the Nets won Game 4 at home, 96–79 at the Brendan Byrne Arena to even the series.^[30][31][32] However, the Nets lost Game 5 to the Cavaliers on the road, 99–89 at the Coliseum at Richfield, thus losing in a hard-fought five-game series.^[33][34][35]

Aftermath

Following the season, Bowie was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers after four seasons with the Nets,^[36][37][38] while Dudley signed as a free agent with the Portland Trail Blazers,^[39][40][41] Brown signed with the Dallas Mavericks, Addison was released to free agency, and King and Cheeks both retired.

Tragedy struck the Nets in the following off-season, as Petrović was killed in a car accident in Germany at the age of 28 on June 7, 1993; Petrović was a passenger in a car driven by his girlfriend, which lost control and crashed head-on into a truck on a rain-drenched highway near Munich, Germany. Shortly before his death, Petrović last played for the Croatian national basketball team in the European Championships in Wroclaw, Poland.^[42][43][44] The Nets retired Petrović's number 3 jersey later on that year, during a game against the Indiana Pacers at the Brenden Byrne Arena on November 11, during the next season; he would later on be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame posthumously in 2002.^[45][46][47]

Petrović's girlfriend, Hungarian model and basketball player, Klara Szalantzy, 23, was not seriously hurt in the accident, while another passenger, Hilal Edebal, 23, was seriously injured with certain lifelong consequences. Edebal was also a basketball player, and played overseas in Turkey, but had to retire after the accident; reports of the accident misidentified her name as "Hilal Haene", and her age as 53.^[47]

Season standings

z – clinched division title

y – clinched division title

x – clinched playoff spot

Regular season

Regular season

Playoffs

Player statistics citation:^[23]