G League Watch: Nets Prepare for Return to Canada

The Long Island Nets, Brooklyn’s G League affiliate, are now 12-14 in the regular season before a two-game home stretch in Quebec, Canada.

The Nets won one and dropped one against the Indiana Mad Ants and Westchester Knicks on March 4 and 11, respectively. Long Island center Drew Timme paced the team against Indiana with 27 points and 15 rebounds. The former Gonzaga man has impressed with the Nets' affiliate this season after arriving from the Stockton Kings.

Five other Net players — Tosan Evbuomwan, Trevon Scott, Terry Roberts, new two-way Tyson Etienne and Mark Armstrong — also scored in double figures on that night. Two-way forward Evbuomwan has been spending time in the G League after initially cracking Brooklyn’s rotation at the beginning of this year.

Evbuomwan got some Brooklyn help in Long Island’s game against Westchester. Dariq Whitehead played 26 minutes in that game, finishing with nine points, five rebounds, one assist and two steals on 3-for-10 shooting. Whitehead has only featured in 10 NBA games this season, and he’s only crossed the 10 minute mark twice. The ex-Duke prospect is averaging 3.9 points in 5.9 minutes of action. In related news, swingman Anthony Tarke made his Long Island debut.

Timme again exploded for a double-double with 40 points and 12 boards, but he didn’t get enough help this time. Meanwhile, the Knicks could count on the likes of Chuma Okeke, Moses Brown, Kevin McCullar Jr., TJ Warren and Pacome Dadiet, who have differing degrees of important NBA experience.

Next, ‘Les Nets’ return to Canada for a back-to-back on March 13 and 14 against the Memphis Hustle. This is Long Island’s final trip up north this season, where the team will have played a total of six games in Laval, Quebec. The first of those games was on Jan. 24.

The Nets' games in the outskirts of Montreal are the first of its kind in the G League, which had not yet been in the area. Long Island's home arena is Place Bell, a 10,000-seater that typically hosts the Rocket de Laval ice hockey team. There is no indication yet as to whether the Nets might return to Canada next season.

Long Island’s home arena in New York, the Nassau Coliseum, faces somewhat of an uncertain future. In August 2024, the Nassau County Legislature approved a 42-year lease of the Coliseum's property to the Las Vegas Sands conglomerate. Sands intends to build a casino and resort there in a project reportedly priced at $6 billion. However, that idea has received environmental and infrastructural pushback.

The Village of Garden City, in Nassau County, filed a lawsuit to stop the proposed casino. Hofstra University or the Sierra Club Long Island Group environmental nonprofit are other local actors opposing Sands’ project. A Newsday/Siena College poll from Nov. 2023 found that 49% of Nassau County residents were against the Sands casino, while 42% supported its construction. On Long Island as a whole, the poll was a "dead heat" with 46% for each side.

Want to join the discussion? Like Nets on SI on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to stay up to date on all the latest Nets news. You can also meet the team behind the coverage.