NBA

Nets question of day: Who’s hoisting 3-balls?

With training camp just days away, we’re going to ask a question per day about the upcoming Nets season.

Are the Nets capable of becoming a top-five 3-point shooting team?

The Nets, like most teams around the NBA, have become more and more dependent in recent years on the two most efficient ways to score: shots at the rim and behind the 3-point line.

Despite playing at one of the slowest paces in the league, the Nets finished in the top 10 in 3-pointers attempted and made. But the Nets were much further down the ranks in percentage of 3-pointers made, finishing 17th out of 30 at 35.7 percent from beyond the arc.

A quick look at that ranking would lead one to assume the Nets have a long way to go in order to approach the top five 3-point shooting teams in the league. However, the gap isn’t quite as big as it would appear at first glance.

The Spurs, for instance, tied with the Knicks for fourth overall in 3-point shooting, hitting 37.6 percent. The Spurs took four more shots than the Nets did from 3-point range last season, but they made 35 more. In other words, if the Nets shoot exactly as many 3-pointers as they did last season while making an extra one every other game, they would finish well over 37 percent, a number that in each of the past four season would have placed them no worse than eighth in the league.

So can the Nets make that kind of leap? They imported a pair of very good 3-point shooters in Paul Pierce and Jason Terry, each of whom made more than 37 percent of their 3-pointers last season on more than 300 attempts. That gives the Nets four players – with Deron Williams and Joe Johnson – who hit those benchmarks last season.

However, it’s unclear how much supplementary shooting the Nets will have around those four. While the Nets have plenty of players – including Brook Lopez, Kevin Garnett and Andray Blatche – who are very capable shooters out to 20 feet, they may not have another consistent 3-point shooting threat on the roster.

Shaun Livingston, who was signed to replace C.J. Watson as the backup point guard behind Williams, took one 3-pointer in more than 1,100 minutes for the Cavaliers last season. Andrei Kirilenko is a career 31 percent 3-point shooter and hit 29 percent from behind the arc for the Timberwolves last season. Alan Anderson has shown flashes of being a very good 3-point shooter – in smaller samples he hit 41 percent in 2005-06 and 39 percent in 2011-12 – but he hit 33 percent from deep while taking nearly 300 for the Raptors last season.

The one potential wild card in the equation is Mirza Teletovic. If he is able to beat out Reggie Evans for the backup power forward minutes behind Garnett, Teletovic could become another strong 3-point shooting option – particularly playing with so many good offensive options around him.