Dzanan Musa paces Long Island Nets to 3rd straight win

Brooklyn Nets assignee Dzanan Musa scored 21 points and the Long Island Nets battled back to beat Raptors 905 Friday night, 97-90.

On a night where the shooting was colder inside Paramount Fine Foods Centre than the weather was outside, the Long Island Nets battled back to beat Raptors 905 97-90 Friday night in NBA G League action in Mississauga, Ontario, in the Toronto suburbs.

Long Island (3-0) remained unbeaten on the young season, taking the lead back for good on Jordan McLaughlin‘s 3-pointer with 4:45 remaining. The Nets had trailed by seven entering the final quarter before they were able to rally to hand Raptors 905 (2-1) its first loss.

The Nets struck quickly out of the game, with Brooklyn Nets assignee Dzanan Musa dropping nine of his team-high 21 points in the first quarter as Long Island surged to a 32-22 lead after leading by as much as 16 points.

But Long Island had trouble buying a basket over the next two periods — scoring 31 points combined — to enter the fourth period down 70-63.

Theo Pinson, on a two-way contract with the Brooklyn Nets, scored 11 of his 18 points to key the comeback for Long Island.

The Nets shot just 37 percent (35-for-94) and were only 5-for-36 from 3-point range (14 percent), but that was still better than the Raptors, who mustered just 33 percent (31-for-93) and hit only 7-of-37 from deep (19 percent).

Mitch Creek had 10 points and 15 rebounds for Long Island, Drew Gordon added 13 boards while starting at center in place of Alan Williams, Brooklyn’s other two-way contract player who sat out with a sore right knee, and point guard Shannon Scott grabbed 11 rebounds to go with seven assists.

Kamari Murphy blocked two shots in 17 minutes off the bench for the Nets.

Malachi Richardson scored a game-high 26 points for the Raptors, Chris Boucher added 19 points, 10 rebounds and seven blocked shots and Kay Felder had five assists. Khadeem Lattin notched three steals in just 15 minutes.

Long Island had a whopping 67-40 edge on the boards, offsetting their 21 turnovers a bit.

Musa is averaging 21.0 points and 6.7 rebounds in three games with the Long Island club, shooting.460/4-for-15/13-for-15. He was selected by the Brooklyn Nets in the first round of the 2018 NBA Draft, taken 29th overall.

Pinson, an undrafted free agent out of North Carolina who signed a two-way deal with Brooklyn in August, is averaging 23.0 points, 6.3 rebounds, 5.7 assists and 1.0 blocks in 36.9 minutes a game thus far, shooting .537/.450/16-for-18.

Long Island returns home to Nassau Coliseum Sunday afternoon to host the Delaware Blue Coats, a Philadelphia 76ers affiliate, for a 3 p.m. Eastern start. Delaware (0-3) has been idle since a 116-110 loss on the road to the Westchester Knicks on Tuesday.