Egor Dëmin’s first preseason outing offered a clean snapshot of why Brooklyn is so interested in what comes next. In the Nets’ 124-90 win over the Charlotte Hornets on Tuesday, the 20-year-old guard flashed the kind of downhill pressure and playmaking that can give Jordi Fernández’s offense a different gear.
The box score was modest: six points on 2-for-5 shooting, 2-for-3 from deep, plus five assists in 18 minutes. But the story was in how those assists came together. Dëmin threaded a behind-the-back feed to Day'Ron Sharpe for a dunk in the second quarter, then later beat a messy closeout, got all the way into the paint and forced Hornets center Ryan Kalkbrenner to help.
That kind of action was not a regular part of Dëmin’s rookie season, when most of his attempts came from beyond the arc. He finished as the fifth-best rookie shooter, hitting 38.5% and knocking down 124 threes, fourth-most among rookies.
What Brooklyn saw over the summer hinted that the rookie version of Dëmin was only part of the picture. The Nets’ 2025 first-round pick showed major growth as a driver in the California Classic and Las Vegas Summer League, and he shot perfectly inside the arc even while his jumper was coming and going. He opened the California Classic with 23 points on 8-for-15 shooting against the Sacramento Kings, and his efficiency plus multiple 20-point games earned him All-Summer League second team honors.
That summer work, including time in the weight room, showed up again against Charlotte. When Dëmin attacks closeouts instead of settling, Brooklyn’s offense looks very different. He’s already an elite three-point shooter, and adding the ability to punish defenders off the bounce fits right into Fernández’s free-flowing, fast-moving system.
The broader picture matters too. Dëmin is part of the Flatbush Five, the group of five first-round picks from last year, and his progress factors into how general manager Sean Marks approaches the team’s stockpile of draft capital. Marks has collected 13 first-round picks over the past several seasons.
Still, Tuesday was only one preseason game, and the Hornets were missing Coby White, Kon Knueppel, Brandon Miller and rookie Christian Anderson. Dëmin will have more chances to build on it over Brooklyn’s next three preseason games: Thursday against the Philadelphia 76ers, next Monday against the Washington Wizards and next Wednesday against the Miami Heat.
He could also sit out one of those games for rest, while Fernández may use some of the minutes to look at the Exhibit 10 and two-way players. Even so, Dëmin’s early preseason stretch is pointing in a clear direction. He’s starting to look like a starter on a rookie-scale contract who can help shape what Brooklyn wants to be.
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Michael Porter Jr. led the way with 16 points, while Julius Randle added 13 as Brooklyns offensive flow looked sharper than it has at other points in the exhibition slate. It is still preseason, of course, but the combination of perimeter shooting and control for long stretches gave the Nets something tangible to point to as they continue sorting out how this rotation fits together. [Read more 🡒]