LAS VEGAS — Mikel Brown Jr.’s Las Vegas Summer League debut featured a slow start, a strong finish and all kinds of spectacular plays in between Friday night.
The Nets’ rookie lottery pick paired with second-year backcourt mate Egor Dëmin to lead Brooklyn’s 91-65 rout of the Knicks at Thomas & Mack Center.
The guards shared team-high scoring honors with 20 points.
But after Dëmin had carried the Nets early as Brown found his way into the game, the latter poured in 16 points after halftime, drawing “oohs” and “ahhs” with several highlights.
“Seeing my teammates, getting them open shots, seeing the ball go through the hoop obviously gets you going as well. But I know how much work I put in to get to this point,” said Brown. “The ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’ are coming just because that’s just how I play.
“Yeah, I mean, like I said, I’m a savant when it comes to this stuff, man. I love the game of basketball. I love when my teammates look successful. It brings me joy because that means it’s not just me, but everybody got it going.”
Brown shot 6-for-12, including 3-for-6 from 3-point range. He added three assists, two steals and a block.
“He’s extremely talented overall,” said Dëmin. “His shooting ability, his ability to create his own shot, and how shifty he is, he’s gonna give a lot of trouble to the defenders just because of his feel for the game and his talent. Now the part of his game is to adapt to the physicality, which took me a while last year.”
… We’re gonna do everything we have [to] for it to happen as fast as possible.”
Brown insisted that won’t take long. And he played feisty defense that helped spark Brooklyn’s third-quarter blitz.
The Nets trailed by a point going into the second quarter and edged ahead 38-33 by halftime. But they blew the game open in the third.
Brooklyn blitzed the Knicks 30-9 in that period, holding them to 2-for-15 shooting with six turnovers. Brown’s nine points, three assists and a steal in the fourth helped the Nets blow it open.
The sixth overall pick has made it a point to prove he can hold his own on the defensive end.
“Yeah. absolutely. I really do feel like that I can defend; like, I really do feel like I’m not a liability,” said Brown.
“People put that burden on me, like, all his physicality and stuff like that. At the end of the day, man, mano a mano, you ain’t finna score on me. That’s just my mentality. And that’s how I carry it.”
Chaney Johnson had 11 points, nine boards and a 3-pointer, finishing +35 playing center at just 6-7.
Rookie Joshua Jefferson hasn’t been able to practice with the Nets, but did workouts to stay sharp. Now that the Julius Randle trade that brought Jefferson to Brooklyn has been made official, coach Dutch Gailey said he’s hopeful the first-round pick can debut Saturday today against Atlanta.
