Spencer Dinwiddie joked "too much eggnog" was to blame for the Brooklyn Nets setting an NBA record for shooting futility in a 94-82 loss to the New York Knicks.

With Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving watching on from the sideline, the Nets made just eight of their 28 two-point field goal attempts at Barclays Center on Boxing Day.

As reported on the NBA's official website, that represents the fewest since the Fort Wayne Pistons beat the Minneapolis Lakers 19-18 in 1950. The shot clock was implemented four years later.

Dinwiddie was one of just two Brooklyn players to reach double figures, scoring 25 points on 5-of-15 shooting, and he playfully suggested the festive period was behind their woes.

"Let's go with too much eggnog," Dinwiddie said. "I don't know what else to tell you.

"We were really, really bad. Like laughably bad. We shot really bad. Probably historically bad."

Jarrett Allen acknowledged Brooklyn's attack seized up as the number of misses increased and said there was little they could do to stop Knicks forward Julius Randle, who scored a game-high 33 points.

"We were all searching for our shot, that's the most political way to put it," Allen said. "We could've moved the ball more, but at the end of the day we were all frustrated.

"It's a tough task when you shoot like 25 per cent, it makes playing defense harder, it makes running up and down the court harder, but at the end of the day we have to have more effort.

"Missing shots, we had a lot of open threes … and just on their offensive end they weren't missing. Julius Randle had a great game, credit to him, and we just couldn't stop him."

Nets head coach Kenny Atkinson added: "They just outplayed us, plain and simple. You could say we missed a lot of open shots but I don't buy that, give them credit they were just simply the better team tonight.

"[Misses] affected our morale, it affected our spirit, it affected our physicality and that's the difference between an average team and a really good team, and it brought us down to average with that spirit, it affected us all around.

"We had a lot of guys off tonight… I don't think anybody was in rhythm tonight, including myself."