Egor Demin’s second season with the Brooklyn Nets is shaping up as a real test of what kind of player he’s going to be.
The Nets spent last year in the thick of a rebuild, coming off a season near the bottom of the Eastern Conference and then adding five rookies through first-round picks. They ended up near the bottom again, but there was no shortage of young names to track. Among them, Demin quickly stood out as the rookie who made the biggest impact.
That wasn’t a shock on its own. Demin was Brooklyn’s lone lottery pick in that 2025 draft class, so the expectation was always that he’d rise to the top of the rookie group. What made his debut more interesting was the way he did it, and the questions that now follow him into year two.
The biggest pre-draft concern centered on his shooting from deep. At BYU, he hit just 27.3% of his 3-pointers, so there was plenty of skepticism about whether that part of his game would hold up in the NBA. Instead, he answered that doubt fast, knocking down 38.5% of his attempts from beyond the arc as a rookie.
His shot profile was almost entirely built around the perimeter. Of his 8.6 shots per game, 6.2 came from long range, which works out to 71.7% of his attempts. He didn’t qualify for the NBA leaderboards because of his limited games played, but that 3-point attempt rate would have ranked 15th in the league.
That’s where the conversation gets more complicated. Players near the top of that kind of list are usually off-ball specialists, and Demin was one of Brooklyn’s top ball handlers last season. A heavy diet of 3s and a strong percentage is a good thing, but it also raises the question of how much of his value comes with the ball in his hands.
Next season should clarify that picture. Michael Porter Jr., Julius Randle and Mikel Brown Jr. are expected to handle the ball often for Brooklyn, which could change Demin’s role and make his fit easier to read. He already showed he can work as an off-ball shooter, since more than 80% of his made 3s last season were assisted.
The bigger issue is what Brooklyn thought it was getting when it brought him in. The Nets expected Demin to be a more dangerous on-ball weapon, and with more competition for touches coming, his second year could go a long way toward defining the direction of his career.
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