Dutch Gaitley knew what was coming when he saw the water bottles.<\/p>\n
His players had earned the ambush. He had, too.<\/p>\n
Less than 24 hours after a sloppy California Classic opener in Sacramento, the Nets\u2019 summer league coach got the response he wanted. It came in an 89-69 win over the Milwaukee Bucks from a lineup missing most of the names fans were waiting to see, and it ended with Gaitley soaked by a celebration his players had ready.<\/p>\n
Brooklyn is 1-1 through two California Classic games, with Monday night\u2019s matchup against the Golden State Warriors bringing the first look at Mikel Brown Jr. The No. 6 overall pick is expected to make his Nets debut after sitting out the first two games.<\/p>\n
Danny Wolf hasn\u2019t played because of lower back soreness. Egor D\u00ebmin, Ben Saraf, Drake Powell, Tyler Bilodeau and Chaney Johnson all played Saturday against the Sacramento Kings, then sat Sunday against Milwaukee as the Nets rested most of their top summer league players.<\/p>\n
Because of it, the weekend split into two evaluations. Here\u2019s what we learned.<\/p>\n
THE NETS FOUND THEIR PACE<\/p>\n
Gaitley didn\u2019t hide what bothered him after Saturday\u2019s 79-76 loss to Sacramento. The Nets opened well, built an 18-point lead and got a strong performance from D\u00ebmin, but the offense stalled for stretches. Brooklyn committed 20 turnovers, gave up 10 offensive rebounds and allowed 42 points in the paint.<\/p>\n
Darius Acuff Jr. scored 25 points despite shooting 9-for-29, and Sacramento found enough late offense to take the game. Brooklyn couldn\u2019t close.<\/p>\n
Gaitley pointed to \u201cexecution stuff,\u201d turnovers, offensive rebounds and organization as areas the team needed to clean up. One day later, with most of the Nets\u2019 higher-profile summer league players sitting, the second group gave him the response he wanted.<\/p>\n
The Nets had three fast-break points against Sacramento. They had 17 against Milwaukee. They assisted on eight of 22 made field goals in the opener, then 22 of 35 on Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really emphasized attacking in transition,\u201d Gaitley said after Sunday\u2019s win.<\/p>\n
Pace and space, Gaitley said, is one of the team\u2019s first staples. The Nets lived by those principles on Sunday. Hunter Sallis pushed the ball. Dion Brown found people. Ben Humrichous lit the Bucks up from deep. Dwight Murray Jr. stepped into shots. Dain Dainja finished inside.<\/p>\n
Sallis had 15 points, six rebounds, six assists and two blocks. Brown added nine points, eight assists, six rebounds and two steals. Murray scored 14. The ball moved, the floor opened and the Nets played with a purpose missing for too much of Saturday.<\/p>\n
D\u00cbMIN GAVE BROOKLYN SOMETHING TO BUILD ON<\/p>\n
D\u00ebmin gave the Nets the best individual performance from Game 1, finishing with 23 points on 8-for-15 shooting, added seven rebounds and went plus-eight in a game Brooklyn lost by three. His jumper came and went, as he finished 2-for-8 from deep, but his size and feel gave the Nets a steady hand without Brown available. He looked far more comfortable attacking the rim. His handle looked tighter. The offseason work is beginning to show.<\/p>\n
Now comes the next step in the evaluation. Brown\u2019s expected debut against Golden State gives Brooklyn its first look at the next guard prospect chosen to elevate the teams rebuild. It also gives the Nets their first chance to see how Brown and D\u00ebmin synergize and share creation duties.<\/p>\n
HUMRICHOUS TURNED SHOOTING INTO A STATEMENT<\/p>\n
Humrichous made the strongest case among the players who entered the rotation Sunday. He finished with 15 points and eight rebounds, went 5-for-12 from 3-point range and closed plus-21.<\/p>\n
Gaitley praised his willingness to keep shooting, even after misses.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s going to be his superpower if he\u2019s going to have success in the NBA,\u201d Gaitley said.<\/p>\n
Brooklyn didn\u2019t just reduce the job to shooting. Gaitley said the staff gives each player role definitions, and one of Humrichous\u2019 points of emphasis was pushing beyond his comfort zone defensively, especially with ball pressure.<\/p>\n
The Illinois product understood the assignment and gave Brooklyn shooting, rebounding and buy-in. For a player trying to separate himself in a crowded summer setting, that is a strong start.<\/p>\n
THE RESERVES MADE SUNDAY WORTH IT<\/p>\n
Sunday could\u2019ve been forgettable. Instead, Brooklyn\u2019s deeper summer league group won by 20 and, as Gaitley put it, set the tone for \u201cBrooklyn basketball.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dainja was a major part of it. Gaitley called him \u201cthe boogeyman,\u201d a fitting description for a 6-9 big who gave Brooklyn force, touch and better conditioning after not playing Saturday. He had 10 points, seven rebounds, two assists and one turnover in 16:57, while finishing plus-22.<\/p>\n
\u201cGuys who are built like that, if they can sustain, he\u2019s very good with the ball,\u201d Gaitley said. \u201cIf he can sustain that for a long run, he can be effective.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gaitley grouped Dainja with Brown, Murray and Aaron Scott, all of whom sat in Game 1 and played meaningful minutes in Game 2. They impacted the game. They won their minutes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dutch Gaitley knew what was coming when he saw the water bottles. His players had earned the ambush.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":287452,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,9,24,63,110204],"class_list":["post-288380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-summer-league-nets"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288380"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288380\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}