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NEW ORLEANS — After six games on the shelf injured, Brooklyn’s Egor Dëmin came back with his best game of the young season.
Dëmin returned from a leg injury with a team-high 22 points to lead the Nets’ 145-111 laugher in New Orleans.
“It just talks about how ready he was to get back and impact the group and the game,” Jordi Fernández said. “And not just his passing, his shot-making, but also driving into the paint and playing with a lot of pace.”
Dëmin had been out with a bone bruise in his right leg suffered Oct. 27 at Boston.
In his return he shot 5 of 8 overall and 4 of 6 from deep.
“Egor played great, coming back, playing like that. It helped a lot,” Mo Wagner said.
“It was good to see Egor shoot the ball well. It’s one of his better games he’s had so far this season,” Michael Porter Jr. said “It was good to see him play well for sure.”
Dëmin had been off to a slow start. He had been averaging 7.8 points on 31 percent shooting and 28.6% from deep.
With Nolan Traore (tight right calf) and Mikel Brown Jr. (illness) both out, he had to start at point guard, and handled ball pressure well enough.
“It was great to see Egor back,” Day’Ron Sharpe said. “He’s been excited and working hard all summer for this season. So it’s great to see him come back from the injury and have the game he had.”
Dëmin got into the paint enough to go a team-high 8 of 10 from the line and finish a plus-29.
Orleans. Getty Images
“I didn’t try to force anything. All the praise to my teammates, who were finding me in those situations where I could be successful for them. And when you see the shot going in, the next one is going with even more chance,” Dëmin said. “I was super comfortable out there with what we’ve been doing on the court with everybody else. So yeah, I’m super grateful. None of that would be there without our game plan and my teammates.”
Pelicans coach Jamahl Mosley — who coached Wagner in Orlando before getting fired in May — got a technical for barking something at his ex-player.
“Ah, we just miss each other, I’d say. Just miss each other,” Wagner said. “No, real talk, I don’t think this is a conflict that is expressed over the media, I don’t think that’s appropriate. …They gave me five years of being on a team, which I really cherish, trying to win a championship together. Of course there’s some emotions in that. But nothing negative from my side at all.”
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Ben Saraf, Joshua Jefferson, Tyler Bilodeau and Grant Nelson were out on G League assignments.
“[Brown’s] not feeling good, and he’s day to day. So, we hope he’s feeling better because he’s been outstanding…We know he’ll be back soon,” Fernández said. “Nolan is day to day too. We hope he’s back soon.”
Bennedict Mathurin (thumb) and Trey Murphy III were out for the Pelicans.
