With Indiana’s Victor Oladipo out with injury, D’Angelo Russell has been selected as his replacement in the NBA All-Star game.
The Brooklyn Nets have their first NBA All-Star since Joe Johnson in 2014. It’s guard D’Angelo Russell, who’s been announced as Victor Oladipo’s (injured) replacement.
Shams Charania of The Athletic was first to report.
Brooklyn's D'Angelo Russell has been selected as Victor Oladipo's replacement as an East reserve in the NBA All-Star game, sources tell @TheAthleticNBA @WatchStadium.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) February 1, 2019
It comes as no surprise to Brooklyn fans, who’ve been watching Russell will the Nets to the middle of the Eastern Conference standings. The 22-year old guard is posting career averages across the board and had a stellar January.
Brooklyn went 11-4 behind Russell’s 23.8 points, 7.3 assists, and .413 shooting percentage from long range. Most notably, he tied his career-high 40 points against the Orlando Magic on January 18th:
Russell is making an even larger name for himself ahead of the biggest summer in his career. His first All-Star selection will come just months before he enters restricted free agency.
Brooklyn has yet to engage the guard on talks over retaining him beyond this season, but one has to think that General Manager Sean Marks has it somewhere on his to-do list.
The NBA will host a live draft of the All-Star teams, with players being selected to join either team LeBron or team Giannis. It will be held on Feb. 7 on TNT.
Then teams will suit up on February 17th, to culminate the NBA’s annual All-Star weekend. Brooklyn now has representatives in both the game itself and hopefully in the three-point shootout.
Adam Silver and company have yet to announce the final participants in the shooting contest, but signs are pointing to Nets guard Joe Harris as a name to watch.
Brooklyn is currently on the road to Orlando, for a Friday night face-off with the Magic. Tip-off is 7:00 p.m. ET.
