Brooklyn Nets steamroll Washington Wizards in preseason game #2, 131-92

“I think we’re all excited. We’ve been working really hard. The whole month of September was just a grind for us, and I think everybody’s excited to kind of beat up on somebody else.”

That was first-year Brooklyn Net Shake Milton discussing the unofficial end to training camp, as Brooklyn’s preseason contest vs. the Washington Wizards on Monday night marked the beginning of real competition. Three preseason games this week, then the start to the regular season.

Ziaire Williams, are you also excited to beat up on somebody else?

“Yeah, one-thousand percent man. I’m tired of guarding Cam Thomas and Cam Johnson man, I’ve had plenty of reps against them.”

Preseason talk is to be taken with a grain of salt — as fans of the team that employs Ben Simmons well know — but every Net has emphasized how grueling Jordi Fernández’s inaugural training camp has been. Conditioning, hustle, effort, none of these drills too extreme, just more of them.

“You know, nowadays you go up and down two or three times, and they say your load is too high, right? So it’s not too much of that over here,” half-joked Williams.

So it’s no wonder Fernández — who spent much of the night windmilling his arm like a third-base coach to call for full-court pressure — called a timeout three minutes into Monday’s contest, following two possessions where Jordan Poole walked into buckets without any ball-pressure.

“We started okay, but we didn’t find a way to apply our ball-pressure like we’re supposed to, picking up full-court,” said Fernández.

However, his team responded strongly enough to finish the quarter with a 28-20 lead, while Nets fans likely noticed a development on the other end: Ben Simmons!

Simmons finished his 13-minute first half with a team-high 11 points, five boards, and two assists on 5-of-7 shooting. His last bucket, a hanging alley-oop tip-in from Dennis Schröder, didn’t break the backboard, but it did prompt YES Network’s Frank Isola to immediately say, “it looks like the surgery was successful.”

Simmons came out of the halftime break with the warm-up on; his night was done, but it was already a successful one.

Fernández admitted a clerical error on his part capped Simmons’ minutes at 13 (the plan was always a second-half break) while noting how his starting point guard did what he expected: pushing the pace, getting downhill, and finding the open man.

As for the rest of the game, the Nets ceded their lead to the Wizards midway through the second quarter. However, a Jaylen Martin/Jalen Wilson/Noah Clowney/Shake Milton/Ziaire Williams lineup may have been doomed from the start, and when the starters came back in, they immediately course-corrected.

Though Washington did miss many of their open looks, Brooklyn won the possession battle by only turning it over five times and allowing five offensive boards by the time main rotation players were subbed out toward the end of the third quarter.

“Well, this game, we put together a full game,” said Dorian Finney-Smith. “I feel like that first game we played in spurts; it was a full game, from the starters to the bench. Y’all got a glimpse of how coach wants to play, he wants to pick up full-court, wants to be disruptive and shoot a lot of threes.”

In that third quarter, Cam Thomas and Shake Milton, a couple of bucket-getting combo guards, reminded us that they do indeed get buckets. Thomas finished with a game-high 17 points, Milton with 16, and Jalen Wilson rounded out the trio with 14 points, with much of the trio’s collective damage coming in the third quarter…

As a whole, the Nets reminded us what having a handful of real NBA players looks like. No, Brooklyn will not be a good NBA team this season in part because, yes, they will trade some of those real NBA players to ensure a successful tank. But my god, the Washington Wizards are awful. Bub Carrington might be good though.

The Nets even ran up the score in the fourth quarter, entering the final dozen with an 89-70 lead and turning it into something much larger than that. Every player but Amari Bailey scored on the night, Noah Clowney dunked a couple times, and Tyrese Martin made some highlight plays.

As a nightcap, Cui Yongxi delighted the Barclays Center crowd (and his bench) with a couple buckets…

…and though he got a little ahead of himself by calling an iso that ended in an airball, it was a joyous end to the blowout.

“[He] plays with a joy man, and I love to see he’s always smiling,’ said Finney-Smith. “When you look at him play, you realize it’s just basketball because he always got a smile on his face.”

Cam Thomas, with an equally big smile, said of the moment: “Everybody got lit and then he called for the iso, so everybody just went went crazy. So it was good, definitely good. You know, everybody — we all like each other. I feel like that also helps us as a team. We all like each other.”

While Thomas’ reaction was nothing but genuine, it is easier to like each other when you’re winning. And the Nets won big on Monday night. It was even fun! Preseason, baby!

Final Score: Brooklyn Nets 131, Washington Wizards 92

Next Up

Brooklyn will play their second of three preseason games this week on Wednesday night against the Philadelphia 76ers. Tip-off is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. ET from the Wells Fargo Center.