The Nets finally reached the end of a season that felt longer than 82 games. Way longer. If you lived it, it felt like an eternity.

It ended Sunday in Toronto with a 136-101 loss at Scotiabank Arena, closing Brooklyn’s year at 20-62. The finale looked like the last few weeks have looked, the Nets short-handed again, Toronto still pushing toward the postseason and playing like it. The Raptors started Brandon Ingram, Scottie Barnes, Jakob Poeltl, RJ Barrett and Immanuel Quickley, while Brooklyn was down nine bodies in the season finale.

Now comes the offseason the Nets have been planning around for months.

Brooklyn didn’t frame 2025-26 as a season built on wins. It was built around exposure, development and clearing space for what could come next. Sean Marks, entering arguably his most pivotal offseason as Brooklyn’s general manager, didn’t mince words in a recent YES Network interview with Ryan Ruocco, and the numbers back it up

“Knowing that our objective this year was to have the young guys play and play real NBA minutes,” Marks said. “That was the number one priority in between the G League and the development there and also here. We now lead the league in rookie minutes the whole year, so that’s exactly what we wanted to do.”

The Nets leaned into it from draft night forward. After falling to No. 8 in the 2025 NBA Draft, Brooklyn made history, taking Egor Dëmin at that slot and then selecting Nolan Traoré, Drake Powell, Ben Saraf and Danny Wolf later in the first round to set an NBA record with five first-round selections. Over the season, 22 players appeared for Brooklyn, the average age was 23.8, tied with the Washington Wizards for the youngest roster in the NBA, and no player 30 or older appeared in a game.

Head coach Jordi Fernández has kept the same message running through all of it. The wins weren’t only supposed to be found in the standings.

“Losing is not fun, but as an organization we value our wins in a different way,” Fernández said. “Wins can be development and wins can be the experience of these guys being exposed to real games. And I think that we’re in a very good place.”

The other reason Brooklyn can turn the page without panic is the lottery positioning it secured before the finale even tipped. After the Nets’ loss to the Milwaukee Bucks and wins by the Sacramento Kings and Utah Jazz, Brooklyn clinched a bottom-three finish Thursday, locking in a 52.1% chance at a top-four pick and a 14.0% chance at the No. 1 overall pick.

The Nets also can’t slide lower than seventh. The lottery will be held May 10 in Chicago.

This is a rare opportunity for this franchise. The Nets have picked in the top six once in the last 25 years, taking Derrick Favors third in 2010.

There were flashes, too, of what Fernández wants the team to become once the young group has more reps and the roster has more stability. For one stretch, Brooklyn defended at an elite level, posting a 105.4 defensive rating in December, best in the NBA. The offense never held up enough for that to turn into wins, and the injuries kept reshaping everything, but the formula showed itself.

Now the summer arrives with real flexibility and intriguing choices. ESPN’s Bobby Marks projects the Nets will have $31 million in cap space. Brooklyn has until June 28 to decide on Day’Ron Sharpe and Ziaire Williams’ $6.2 million team options, and until June 29 to decide on Josh Minott’s $2.4 million option. After using cap space, the Nets will have the $9.4 million room midlevel exception available. Restricted free agents include Ochai Agbaji, Jalen Wilson, Chaney Johnson, E.J. Liddell and Tyson Etienne. Michael Porter Jr., Noah Clowney, Nic Claxton and Terance Mann are extension-eligible.

And the pick chest remains the backbone. Brooklyn is positioned to own picks Nos. 33 and 43 in addition to its lottery pick. The Nets have 13 first-round picks over the next seven years, including nine that can be traded, plus 19 second-rounders and five recent first-rounders on rookie-scale deals.

And the pick chest remains the backbone. Brooklyn is positioned to own picks Nos. 33 and 43 in addition to its lottery pick. The Nets have 13 first-round picks over the next seven years, including nine that can be traded, plus 19 second-rounders and five recent first-rounders on rookie-scale deals.

So yes, the season was a slog, and the record will sit there like a scar. But the point of the year was deeper than lottery position. It was the setup for everything that comes next, and Fernández has framed that part as the real test, staying steady through the churn, teaching through the losses, and owning the decisions that didn’t work so the next ones do.

“You cannot be overwhelmed. You have to keep going,” Fernández said. “You’ve got to trust everybody, you’ve got to build the right way, try to touch everybody every day and be ready to make mistakes, own them and move on and be better.”