Injuries to Ben Simmons and Day'Ron Sharpe force Nets to play small ball

Necessity is the mother of invention?

Not for the Nets.

In their case, necessity and roster construction are the mother of adaptation.

And what are they adapting to?

A lack of size.

Due to injuries to Ben Simmons and Day’Ron Sharpe, the Nets entered Monday night’s game against the Heat at Barclays Center having to experiment with a small ball lineup.

Sharpe suffered a hyperextended knee in the Nets’ 134-127 overtime loss to the Trail Blazers on Jan. 7. The injury caused the third-year big man to not travel with the team to Paris for last week’s 111-102 loss to Cleveland, and he was unavailable for the fourth of four regular season matchups against Miami.

“[Sharpe’s] a huge piece,” Lonnie Walker said. “His energy, his presence, the (rebounding and) scoring, just his physicality is something that not too many people in the league have consistently.

The Nets are expected to make an announcement updating Sharpe’s status next week.

Already without Simmons due to an impinged nerve in his left lower back, the loss of Sharpe–regardless of duration–drastically reduces both the size and production of the Nets front court.

In 37 games this season, Sharpe is averaging 7.5 points per game and seven rebounds in 16 minutes off the bench per game.

“[Sharpe’s] been great for us,” Cam Johnson said. “He's one of the best rebounders in the NBA. He brings a lot of size and presence to the game. So we're gonna have to play a lot more small ball and [Harry Giles] is going to have to step up and guys [are] going to have to alter their roles a little bit. But I think the one thing that will change is probably you’ll probably get a little bit more small [ball].”

To that end, when starting center Nic Claxton needs to come out of the game, the likelihood is that Dorian Finney-Smith will shift from power forward to center in the Nets’ small ball deployment.

“Obviously, [Claxton] is doing a great job all year holding the paint down,” Johnson said of Claxton, who is averaging 12.2 points, 9.9 rebounds, and 2.3 blocks in 28.3 minutes per game. “But it’s hard to ask him to play 48 [minutes]. So we’ll have to see how it goes.”

Even though he is giving up size at center, Finney-Smith’s ball-handling and three-point shooting would theoretically allow the Nets to play at a high pace.

The Florida product is shooting 43.1 percent from the field and 40.9 percent from three-point range.

“Oh, [Finney-Smith] is one of the best in the league at playing that small ball five. So when we have it you know that’s definitely on the table for us,” said Johnson.

So, too, could be Jacque Vaughn inserting Giles into the lineup, even though the 6-10, fourth-year forward has been limited to 5.6 minutes per game in 11 games this season.

Giles did play three minutes in the loss to Cleveland in Paris, contributing two points, one rebound, and one assist, which did not go unnoticed by Vaughn.

“I loved Harry’s few minutes that he played versus Cleveland with us playing different defenses,” Vaughn said.

So Vaughn has options. But what he needs more than anything is for those who are tasked with scoring to score. Simply because the Nets are coming into games with a near non-existent margin for error.

“He fits into the bucket of a lot of other guys who aren’t shooting the basketball well and that’s a big proponent to why we haven’t been winning games,” Vaughn said of Spencer Dinwiddie, who is shooting 39 percent from the field and 31.5 percent from three this season. “I just think collectively we haven’t made shots.”