In the first game of the season, the Charlotte Hornets gave Nets fans a glimpse of what the season would look like handing the Nets a 136-117 loss. Fast forward to now in December, the two teams sit at 12th and 14th in the Eastern Conference standings amongst trade rumors, promising young talent, and what to look forward to in the 2026 NBA Draft.<\/p>\n
At Barclays Center tonight, the two teams will match up for the second time this season as the Nets will attempt to use their home court to their advantage to even the series\u2026. and maybe just maybe get another promising performance from the Flatbush 5 and\/or Noah Clowney.<\/p>\n
Check out the action at 7:30 p.m. ET on the YES Network, as well as streaming on the Gotham Sports App. For out-of-towners, there\u2019s always NBA League Pass.<\/p>\n
Cam Thomas (left hamstring) and Haywood Highsmith (right knee) will be out with injuries. Nolan Traore is on Long Island duties. Terence Mann is out with right rib soreness. After missing two games to lower back tightness, Michael Porter Jr. is available. Noah Clowney, who has left hip soreness, has the same designation.<\/p>\n
For the Hornets, Josh Green (shoulder), Pat Connaughton (calf), and Grant Williams (knee) will be out. Tre Mann is questionable due to left ankle problems.<\/p>\n
This past weekend was a big deal for the Nets. Despite back to back losses on Friday and Saturday, the Nets saw a breakthrough with their rookies, as Danny Wolf exploded for a career high 22 points against the Bucks and Egor Demin went for 23 against the Philadelphia 76ers. Ben Saraf had a nice performance against the Bucks as well as he added 10 points and seven assists in 29 minutes. And although he\u2019s not a rookie, Noah Clowney is on a rookie contract so we can consider his 31 points vs. the Knicks as a big positive although the game was a big negative.<\/p>\n
These performances will most likely dictate what the Nets will increasingly prioritize for the rest of the season, which is letting the young guys play and develop. Frank Isola of YES has predicted that there will be slow roll-out with the Flatbush 5 playing bigger minutes consistently by the early part of 2026. So, we should expect the four rookies with the big club to play a lot of minutes vs. the Hornets. One of the more interesting aspects of the Hornets game and beyond will be how MPJ\u2019s playstyle can be a counterpart to the development of the rookies.<\/p>\n
As far as the Hornets go, the backcourt of Lamelo Ball and Kon Knueppel can be dangerous for the Nets defense. Even though there has been a plethora of trade rumors concerning Ball, it\u2019s hard to argue against the notion that he is one of the most talented guards in the league, and with Knueppel making a strong case for ROY, the Nets backcourt will have to defend tin order to take the victory.<\/p>\n
Player to Watch: Kon Knueppel<\/p>\n
All of you who believed Kon Knueppel would be the leading scorer among all rookies and a, if not the, leading candidate for Rookie of the Year by the season\u2019s quarter pole, raise your hands. LIARS!<\/p>\n
The 6\u20197\u201d Dukie hasn\u2019t quite surpassed his college teammate in hype, but there\u2019s little doubt that the Hornets front office, dominated by former Nets types, made one smart move in taking Knueppel over Ace Bailey, Tre Johnson and Jeremiah Fears, etc. Knueppel is currently averaging 18.4 points on 47\/41\/90 shooting splits while grabbing 5.7 rebounds and handing out 3.0 in assists, almost all of those numbers better than Cooper Flagg, the odds-on favorite to dominate first year players. He\u2019s been in a bit of a slump over the past three games, hitting only 12-of-36 overall and averaging 12.8 points a game. But that\u2019s not likely an indication he\u2019s hit the rookie wall. Tonight, he may renew old acquaintances with Drake Powell who he saw a lot last year down on Tobacco Road. It\u2019ll be an interesting match-up.<\/p>\n
Indeed, former Nets assistant G Jeff Peterson did very well in the 2025 Draft, taking Knueppel at No. 4, Liam McNeely at No. 29; Sion James at No. 33 and Ryan Kalkbrenner at No. 34. All are contributing. In fact, the 7\u20191\u201d Kalbrenner, along with Knueppel, has to be considered the steal of the Draft so far. The 23-year-old Creighton product, a four-time Big East DPOY, is averaging 9.1 points, 6.7 rebounds and 1.8 blocks while shooting 80.5% (not a typo) to lead the league and challenge for the all-time mark of 72.5%.<\/p>\n
Jimmy Cliff changed music. A pioneer in reggae and the first worldwide reggae star. he died last week at 81 in his native Jamaica whose music he made popular throughout the world.<\/p>\n
Cliff\u2019s contributions included \u201cMany Rivers to Cross,\u201d \u201cWonderful World, Beautiful People,\u201d \u201cYou Can Get It If You Really Want,\u201d and his cover of \u201cI Can See Clearly Now.\u201d He also starred in \u201cThe Harder They Come,\u201d which introduced reggae and Jamaican culture to many.<\/p>\n
He was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2010 and received Jamaica\u2019s highest honor, the Order of Merit. Here\u2019s his monumental \u201cI Can See Clearly Now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the first game of the season, the Charlotte Hornets gave Nets fans a glimpse of what the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,1766,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-57277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-nets-game-previews","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57277","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=57277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}