Nets Prospect Watch: 2025 NBA Draft Offers Several Young Options if Brooklyn Misses on Cooper Flagg

The 2025 NBA Draft is expected to have one of the deepest and best classes in years, with hype growing as March Madness gets closer. At this point in the NBA season, lottery teams have been established, and efforts to get a top draft pick have started to increase.

The Brooklyn Nets, while still in the hunt for the Play-In Tournament at 21-41, are slated to be 6th in the draft with a 42.1% chance at a top-four pick. They sit just 3.5 games back from the 10th-seeded Chicago Bulls, but time is ticking for Brooklyn to sneak into the postseason.

With the Nets expected to be in the top seven of the draft lottery, they'll have a variety of options, given how good the 2025 class should be. Cooper Flagg, Dylan Harper, and Ace Bailey highlight the projected top three, and Brooklyn could get lucky and move up in the lottery. However, assuming they land around their projected pick, the Nets will have to settle for a prospect with less hype.

The 2025 NBA Draft has plenty of players with polished games, but the big reason there is so much is the prospects' potential. All but two players in the top 20 of ESPN's top 100 prospects are currently under 20 years old. Derik Queen (Maryland) and Danny Wolf (Michigan) are the two exceptions.

Many of the early prospects in the top 100 haven't even hit or are just barely over 19 years old. With the influx of international talent into NCAA basketball this season, an overwhelming majority of lottery prospects are college players once again, and are freshmen.

The Nets' biggest needs in the draft are a point guard and a forward, barring the status of stars Cam Thomas and Nic Claxton. Thomas is set to hit restricted free agency, while Claxton could be traded to save Brooklyn money this summer. Aside from that, the Nets can virtually select whoever they want and immediately given them a big role.

Brooklyn will have four first-round picks in 2025 unless there is a major shift in the standings in this final stretch of games. With the amount of draft picks the Nets have and the youth of this year's class, the roster will get even younger, emphasizing development amid this rebuild.

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