Nets stun Rockets with wild last-second rally in payback for Ime Udoka’s dig

Rockets coach Ime Udoka dismissively calling the Nets a “lower-level team” added fuel to the Nets’ fire.

And they burned the Rockets, stunning them with a 99-97 come-from-behind win before 16,564 at Barclays Center.

The Nets pulled out a game that looked all but lost on D’Angelo Russell’s dramatic winner.

Trailing 97-93 with 8.1 seconds left to play, Keon Johnson (team-high 22 points) drilled a 28-footer to pull the Nets within one.

Then with Houston inbounding the ball, Amen Thompson threw a shockingly bad pᴀss and the Nets stole it.

Tosan Evbuomwan got his long arms on it and tapped it out to Russell, who hit a huge 28-footer of his own with 3 seconds left in regulation to put the Nets ahead and send the bench into wild celebration.

Jalen Green’s miss at the buzzer sealed the comeback.

“Euphoria,” was how Nic Claxton described it. “Caught me off guard. But we just stuck with it. Everybody, we stayed positive throughout the whole game, even though it was down and just we stayed together, and we got the win. It was a good feeling.”

The Nets earned a third straight win, and swept the season series with Houston.

Brooklyn is the only East team to defeat Houston twice this season, doing so in the span of four days.

Following Saturday’s win in Houston, Udoka — who was a very real candidate for the Nets job in 2022 when Steve Nash got fired — called them a “lower-level team.”

Jordi Fernandez used it as bulletin board material, and motivational fodder.

“Everybody took it personal,” Johnson said. “Just because we come in every day and compete, not even just against other teams, but we competed to our fullest against each other. So just to read something like that, it was just a lot of fuel on fire.”

Udoka had been a former Nets ᴀssistant under Nash, and Claxton is one of the few players left from that team. He admitted his old coach’s comments were incentive.

“Yeah,” Claxton said. “You know, Ime, that’s my guy. That definitely added a lot of fuel to our fire, him coming out saying what he said.So, yeah, we know what it is, but that definitely made us want to win the game more, for sure.”

The Nets (17-33) snapped an 11-game home losing skid. They hadn’t won at Barclays Center since a Dec. 4 victory over Indiana.

Now their next four games leading into the All-Star break are all at home, including games against fellow lottery hopefuls Washington and Charlotte.

The Nets coughed up an 11-2 second-quarter run.

Alperen Sengun, who missed Monday’s loss against the Knicks with a calf injury, found Green for a 3-pointer to leave the Nets down 40-36 with 2:45 in the half.

Then they switched places, Green finding Sengun, who finished with 24 points and 20 rebounds, for a layup to build the deficit to 57-49 with 7:41 in the third.