Brooklyn Nets center Nic Claxton is trending towards missing his fifth consecutive game when the team welcomes the Boston Celtics on Saturday.
“Nic has not participated in shootaround, I can say that to you. So if that leads you to any direction to seeing if Nic’s gonna be available tomorrow, probably not,” head coach Jacque Vaughn told the New York Post’s Brian Lewis Friday.
Claxton has missed the team’s last three games and will sit out Friday in Chicago after suffering an ankle injury during Brooklyn’s season-opening loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Vaughn has called the breakout center day-to-day when describing the severity of the injury.
Claxton is expected to anchor a Nets defense that many projected to be one of the best units in the league this season. The 24-year-old led the league in stocks (steals + blocks) with 254 in 2022-23, tying Jaren Jackson Jr., and finished 10th in the Defensive Player of the Year voting. Without him, Brooklyn has turned to a small-ball lineup with Ben Simmons and Dorian Finney-Smith in the frontcourt.
While the Nets have seen success in the five-out lineup with Simmons pushing the pace and spraying to shooters, they rank 23rd in defensive rating through four games, allowing 116.3 points per game. However, Brooklyn has made significant improvements in rebounding the basketball, led by Simmons and Finney-Smith, posting the league’s fifth-best defensive rebounding percentage after ranking 28th last season.
The Nets’ small-ball lineup will face difficult tests Friday and Saturday against Chicago’s Nikola Vucevic and Boston’s Kristaps Porzingis. The next opportunity for Nic Claxton to return will come when Brooklyn plays host to the Milwaukee Bucks on Monday.
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