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Reggie Evans has made it his mission to improve Brook Lopez’s game this season.
And now, as Evans and the Nets prepare to kick off their first postseason as Brooklyn’s team tomorrow against the Bulls, he said he thinks his protégé is ready for his first taste of playoff basketball.
“Man, look at Brook,” Evans said after yesterday’s practice. “He’s probably, what, a top two big man? Brook’s shown you everything [this year].
“He’s a whole different person right now. … Ain’t nobody stopping him. The only person that can stop Brook is Brook. That’s it.”
If the Nets are to advance out of their difficult matchup against the Bulls in the opening round of the playoffs, they’re going to need Lopez to be at his best. In a series that is sure to be a grind-it-out, physical series full of half-court basketball, thanks to the slow and steady way both teams play, Lopez will be the most talented offensive big man on the floor.
His game has made big strides this season, one in which he led all NBA centers in scoring at 19.4 points per game, shot better than 52 percent from the field, blocked more than two shots per game and was selected to play in his first All-Star Game in Houston.
Now the Nets need him to take those improvements and make sure they carry over to his play in the postseason, when the intensity is guaranteed to rise a few notches above anything he previously has experienced in his five-year NBA career.
“He’s had an excellent year,” Nets interim coach P.J. Carlesimo said of his starting center. “He’s had an All-Star year. He’s played well against [Chicago], also.
“He’s had, I think, the best year he’s had since he’s been in the league. He’s shooting the ball well from the perimeter. He’s getting inside, getting to the free throw line, when we post him or roll him when we get him in the pick and rolls. He’s night and day better defensively and contesting shots and protecting the rim.”
Lopez’s role will be even more important in the series considering Chicago’s All-Star center, Joakim Noah — the linchpin to coach Tom Thibodeau’s air-tight defense — is hobbled by an ongoing battle with plantar fasciitis in his right foot, which has limited him to 14 minutes off the bench in the final two regular season games for the Bulls, after he had sat out the previous four.
“Joakim is what he is,” Carlesimo said. “He’s one of the best defensive and rebounding centers in the league, but Brook is what he is. He’s one of the better defensive and offensive players in the league, too, so I think it’s going to be a good matchup.
“I’m not worried about Brook. … Brook is going to play well.”
Since Evans came to the Nets in a sign-and-trade with the Clippers last summer as part of the team’s massive overhaul of the roster, he has talked about taking Lopez under his wing and trying to help him improve as a player, and Lopez has given him credit throughout the season as part of the reason why he has had so much success this year after sitting out virtually all of last season with a pair of injuries to his right foot.
And, outside of Lopez rounding back into form after missing seven games back in December with an unrelated injury to that same right foot, Evans has been pleased with what he has seen from him.
“Everything’s been a progress with Lopez,” Evans said. “Everything’s been a stepping-stone. Everything’s kind of been going up and up. The only time he had a moment where he slowed down was when he got hurt. But he came back and worked his way back.
“He blocks shots, which has been huge … and then he gets offensive rebounds, too. I guess [you] can always try to find some flaws, but there ain’t no flaw in Lopez.”
tbontemps@nypost.com