Ziaire Williams suffers a ‘minor’ back fracture, but is closing in on Net’s return

Ziaire Williams suffered a “minor, very minor” back fracture in addition to a contusion after a hard fall during the Nets’ loss Sunday in San Antonio. And while he said he has recovered quickly, he knows he will likely have to continue playing with some pain even after his return.

Williams will continue to take it day by day, and the key player on the bench said he hopes to return Sunday when the Nets host the 76ers.

“It stuck with me,” Williams told The Post on Thursday while at a Raising Cane’s event in Times Square to promote a 2,741-pound carved pumpkin. “…But it’s something that can’t get any worse. So right now it’s just a matter of pain tolerance, so once the pain goes away, it’s never going to be perfect again, at least not right now.

“But as long as it’s just enough to get through, and defensive slides and stuff, then I’ll play.”

Williams, a former first-round pick in his second season with the Nets, has made an attempt to revive his career, averaging 18.3 minutes per game this year, and while he managed just six combined points in two of the games, he erupted for 25 points against the Cavaliers last week to help Brooklyn keep pace with an Eastern Conference contender. Like other veterans on the roster, his role could remain murky on a team that signed five rookies in the first round this season, but Williams showed what he could add during 45 starts and 63 games for Brooklyn last year.

As someone whose defense has become a force, Williams said he takes responsibility for what happened during the Nets’ first three games, when they allowed an average of 128.3 points. Williams watched from the bench on Wednesday as Brooklyn made some moves. They limited the Hawks to pieces about two-quarters of the way, head coach Jordi Fernández said, and he challenged them to keep pushing that to three-quarters before finally becoming a full game of stout defense.

“It’s about putting it together for 48 minutes and reducing the bleeding,” Williams said. “We’ve been down 15, 20 points, so when we watch film and see what we can do better to stop those runs, we’re pretty good when we play out of desperation, man. We apply a lot of pressure, make guys turn the ball over and make bad shots.”

“So we just have to figure out how to do that from the jump,” Williams said.

Michael Porter Jr. has already posted nearly as many 30-point performances in five games (two) this year as he did all of last season with the Nuggets (three), but while Fernández admitted he appreciates his aggressiveness en route to 32 points in the Nets’ loss to the Hawks on Thursday, he was also critical of Porter’s team-high four turnovers. The Nets committed 16 against Atlanta.

“Those are the things that could be better, right?” Fernández said after the match on Thursday. “For example, they scored 27 points from 16 turnovers and we only scored seven from 8. So that 20-point difference is a big problem. I always tell the boys: I give them 14 points.” [turnovers]. Anything over 14 is not good. And if your turnover is the turnover you just give them and they score a layup, that’s not good. You have to be able to turn it around, go back and stop it”