PHOENIX — The Nets shall be with out their main scorer Wednesday in Phoenix in opposition to previous good friend Kevin Durant.
Cam Thomas has joined their lengthy listing of sidelined gamers, dominated out with a sore left hamstring.
Coach Jordi Fernandez pulled Thomas halfway by the third quarter Monday to “protect him from himself.”
The younger guard, who scored 23 factors within the win over Golden State and is averaging a team-high 24.7 factors, had additionally been coping with a sore again and was below the climate Friday in Philadelphia. He’ll get a wanted break.
Noah Clowney may also be out with a left ankle sprain. The Nets haven’t given an replace on the severity or the outcomes of the younger massive man’s MRI examination.
Starters Nic Claxton (decrease again soreness), Dorian Finney-Smith (left ankle sprain) and Cam Johnson (proper ankle sprain) are all questionable in opposition to the Suns.
Cam Johnson sprained his ankle within the first quarter Monday, hobbled by the final seven minutes of the second quarter and didn’t return after halftime.
Day’Ron Sharpe (left hamstring pressure) and Bojan Bogdanović (left foot harm restoration) and two-way Jaylen Martin are out.
Ben Simmons is anticipated to play.
He had been held out of Monday’s win at Golden State as a result of he nonetheless wasn’t cleared to play each ends of back-to-backs.
With the aforementioned massive males all out, wing Ziaire Williams was pressed into beginning as a small-ball 5 as Brooklyn performed five-out at Golden State.
He completed together with his second profession double-double (19 factors, 10 boards, 4 assists) and a game-high plus-12 in 37:17.
“Yeah, amazing performance on both ends,” Fernandez mentioned. “He helped us area the ground, as a result of if you don’t play with a real middle, then it might get typically somewhat funky, proper? Like, who’s the screener? Who’s the curler? How will we area the ground? And he was nice.
“And then defensively, challenging their size, going with his physicality, pushing, rebounding, like you said, close to a double-double. In my opinion — I know he had an amazing performance, I believe it was against Memphis — but I think this one was his best performance of the year.”
Since dropping a crushing back-to-back with late heartbreakers in opposition to Boston (Nov. 8) and Cleveland (Nov. 9), the Nets have been evening and day completely different of their fourth-quarter efficiency from the primary ten video games to their previous eight.
Brooklyn’s Web Ranking jumped from twentieth (minus 4.5) to sixth (13.8), their scoring from twenty eighth to eighth and their 3-point proportion from twenty sixth (.293) to first (.433).
Durant was anticipated to return from harm for the Suns on Tuesday evening in opposition to the Lakers.
Phoenix is 8-1 with the previous Nets star within the lineup.
