Ignas Brazdeikis spent most of his rookie NBA season in the G-League, playing in just nine games for the Knicks.
The second round of 2019 quest for more regular time under new coach Tom Thibodeau gets off to an inauspicious start, but Brazdeikis finally saw his first action in four preseason games in Friday’s 119-83 win over the Cavaliers.
“I just work every day to get better. That is what I mainly focus on to develop my game ”, said Brazdeikis, who scored a point in 17 minutes. “I’m still young. I need to improve a lot. I’m not even close to the player I want to be.
“We have great technical staff, who push us every day. I’m just grateful to be here and I work every day to get better. “
The Michigan product said he had been working on his body and his jump shot all summer at his family’s home in Ontario. He added that the new coaching staff has told him to “just keep on getting better as a whole player, making the game simple … others. Also keep working hard defensively, the ball bouncing, just getting better.” “
The Knicks were without guards Alec Burks (personal reasons), Frank Ntilikina (painful left Achilles), Elfrid Payton (painful left hamstring), Austin Rivers (painful right groin) and Dennis Smith Jr. (painful left quad) and forward Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (disease), Nerlens Noel (painful left knee) and Omari Spellman (painful right knee). Burks will return to the team on Saturday, Thibodeau said.
Point guard Jared Harper, who converted a four-point game in the first quarter and finished with 10 points, former Net According to Pinson, formerly striking Seton Hall Myles Powell (two points in six minutes) and security guard Bryce Brown also saw their first game action.
Thibodeau finished in tie for fifth place in the NBA.com poll of the league’s general managers for the new or relocated coach who will have the greatest impact on his new team.
Freshman Nets coach Steve Nash received the most votes (28 percent), followed by the 76ers Doc Rivers (24 percent), the Clippers’ Read Tyronn and the pelicans’ Stan Van Gundy (16 percent each), Thibodeau (8 percent) and the Bulls’ Billy Donovan (8 percent).