Day’Ron Sharpe emerging as true backup center for Nets
Day’Ron Sharpe is playing his best basketball.
The second-year big man out of North Carolina and No. 29 overall pick in the 2021 NBA Draft has broken into head coach Jacque Vaughn’s Nets rotation — a pleasant development for a young player who had been glued to the bench earlier in the season.
Entering Wednesday night’s matchup against the Houston Rockets, Sharpe had appeared in 41 of 75 possible games in Brooklyn. Yet as of Wednesday, the 6-10 big man played important — and impressive — minutes in each of the Nets’ last five games.
Sharpe is averaging 9.1 points, 5.9 rebounds and 1.3 blocks in 17.4 minutes in the month of March and posted a career-high 20 points to go with 11 rebounds in Brooklyn’s Mar. 21 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
For reference, he is averaging just under five points and five rebounds on the season in its entirety.
Starting center Nic Claxton said he has seen “a mental shift” in Sharpe’s approach to his craft this season. Vaughn echoed a similar sentiment ahead of tipoff against the Rockets on Wednesday.
“I think there comes a point in a young guy’s career where you have to take things more seriously, where you have to take this as a job: This is your profession,” Vaughn said. “And while we talk and preach about how this is fun, it’s still a game, but at the same time, there’s a responsibility that you have, and Day’Ron just over time began to grow into his role and understanding how he can impact the team, understanding the work that goes along with that — whether that’s watching film, of his minutes, other bigs minutes, knowing other dudes in the league, watching other games when you’re not playing that night.
“So there’s an overall just adjustment for a young guy that he’s still going through but gained some knowledge along the way.”
It looked bleak, however, when the DNP—CD’s began to pile.
Sharpe didn’t appear in seven out of eight possible games in a stretch between March 3 and 16. During that stretch, the Nets signed veteran center Nerlens Noel to a 10-day contract and immediately inserted him into the rotation, a sign they weren’t satisfied with the play behind Claxton at the five.
The Nets opted against giving Noel a second 10-day deal, instead signing the 23-year-old, 7-2 center Moses Brown to a 10-day.
Vaughn then inserted Sharpe behind Claxton, and he has been in the rotation ever since. Sharpe was clearly motivated by the newfound competition at his position.
“Of course we wouldn’t do that. We wouldn’t sign those two bigs to motivate Day’Ron Sharpe to be a professional and bring all he has every single day,” Vaughn said sarcastically in Orlando on March 26. “At the end of the day these guys are here in this league because they have a competitive nature about it. That’s why they got here. That’s why they’re the one-percenters.
“And sometimes you have to tap into that competitive nature. Sometimes you can not appreciate the situation that you’re in. It might not look like the way you want it to look on your timing. Sometimes you need a little nudge, and Day’Ron has responded extremely well by having another big on the roster.”
Sharpe’s emergence came as the Nets searched for answers to one of their biggest issues: getting hammered on the glass. The Nets are among the NBA’s worst rebounding teams. They rank bottom-six on the glass since the trade deadline, with Vaughn openly admitting the opposing team’s scouting report say to crash the glass against the Nets.
Sharpe, who was a known glass cleaner at North Carolina, is making a case to be part of the rotation for a team with playoff aspirations.
Even if he doesn’t get his opportunity, he’s going to approach every day as if he’s in the lineup.
“For me personally I just try to attack everyday like I’m a starter playing 40 minutes,” he said. “I lift every day, try to get some conditioning in everyday, and I just, repetition-repetition, on the same things I’m gonna do on the court. So I feel like me just doing that all year long has helped me.”
