Nets rookies Danny Wolf, Ben Saraf get their first NBA shot at Blazers’ Deni Avdija as Israelis share the stage at Barclays

Two Nets rookies walked into Barclays Center on Monday night with a matchup they’d been waiting for since draft night. Danny Wolf and Ben Saraf faced Portland Trail Blazers All-Star forward Deni Avdija for the first time on an NBA court, a storyline that carried meaning for franchise that doubled down on Israeli talent last summer. Brooklyn took Saraf and Wolf with back-to-back picks at Nos. 26 and 27 in the 2025 NBA Draft, a night the Nets also made history by becoming the first team to select five players in the first round. Three fellow Israelis. One of the league’s best at his position. Two rookies still trying to carve out what they’d become. Nets head coach Jordi Fernández said it was the kind of moment everyone should appreciate. “Yeah, it’s special,” Fernández said. “When other countries outside the U.S. and Europe can be represented with three players here, it means the world, and it’s a special day that everybody has to enjoy. I don’t know Deni, but I’m sure he’s excited to play. I know Ben and Danny are.” Avdija, in his second season with Portland after being traded from the Washington Wizards, has been one of the league’s breakout forwards this year. He averaged 24.1 points, 6.9 rebounds and 6.7 assists entering Monday’s game and earned his first All-Star nod in February. He also stood as the most established reference point for what Israeli representation could look like at the NBA level, a high-usage player on a nightly stage. Wolf and Saraf are still in their first chapter. Wolf averaged 9.0 points, 4.9 rebounds and 2.2 assists in 53 games. Saraf averaged 5.5 points, 1.5 rebounds and 3.0 assists in 31 games. Their roles had shifted with the Nets’ season, often tied to injuries and the constant churn of a rebuilding roster. That’s what made the matchup interesting beyond the flag and the passport. It offered a look at the full arc in one game. Avdija, already an All-Star. Wolf and Saraf, still learning how to survive in the NBA, still learning how to impact games consistently. Trail Blazers acting head coach Tiago Splitter, who’d been around enough national-team locker rooms to understand the feeling, put it simply. “I think it’s cool,” Splitter said. “Anytime I played a fellow Brazilian, it was always good to see your friend there. Sometimes you grew up playing in the national team together, under-18s, under-16s, under-21s, whatever national teams together. So, it’s definitely a special moment for a player.” For Brooklyn, it also served as another marker in what the draft had been meant to do. Saraf and Wolf weren’t picked for novelty. They were picked because the Nets believed their skill sets and feel would translate, and because the franchise had been searching for high-IQ connectors who could play modern basketball in modern roles. There was also no ignoring where the game happened. Brooklyn drafted two Israeli rookies and brought them into a borough with a massive Jewish community, and the Nets had been aware of what that meant from the beginning. Fernández wanted it to be more than a nice night. He wanted it to be a glimpse at a future where this wasn’t rare, where it was normal. “It’s one of the two times that we’ll see this and hopefully for many years, see how these guys grow,” Fernández said. “Obviously, Deni, a career year and how much better he has gotten. And then our two young guys, they’re getting better. And I want to see this matchup over the years and how interesting, how cool it is to see them play against each other.”