Nets pick up third-year team options on two 2023 first-round picks; Dariq Whitehead assigned to G League

The Nets have exercised the third-year team options on forward Noah Clowney and guard Dariq Whitehead for the 2025-26 season. Both of the 2023 first-round picks are expected to develop into foundational pieces in the franchise’s current rebuild.

Clowney and Whitehead’s contracts for the 2025-26 season are now fully guaranteed and worth $3.3 million and $3.2 million, respectively, according to Spotrac. Both players have team options in 2026-27. After that, Clowney could become an unrestricted free agent, and Whitehead could become a restricted free agent, if they are not extended ahead of the 2027-28 offseason.

The Nets have until June 29, 2025, to pick up the club option on forward Jalen Wilson, also part of the team’s 2023 draft class.

“From the front office side, we’re looking at it from, ‘Who are the next Nets?’,” general manager Sean Marks said. “Who do we look at and say, OK, this person can be part of this rebuild and this person is on the team for the next two, three years.”

Clowney, 20, averaged 10.5 points, 6.5 rebounds and 2.0 blocks across four starts during his rookie season and averaged 12.1 points per game over the final month of 2023-24. The forward has averaged 9.0 points and 4.0 rebounds through his first three appearances of 2024-25 while shooting 33.3% from the field and from 3-point range. He scored a season-high 13 points in Sunday’s 115-102 defeat of the Milwaukee Bucks.

“I think he could be very good at playing the four, very good at playing the five,” head coach Jordi Fernadez said of Clowney. “The kid can shoot, his size is multi-positional, he’s got a lot of good qualities and abilities to be successful.”

Whitehead appeared in just two regular-season games for Brooklyn last season and spent most of his rookie campaign with G League affiliate Long Island, when healthy. He underwent season-ending surgery in late January to address a stress reaction in his left shin. He shot just 15% from the field and 8% from deep in his four summer league appearances in July.

The 20-year-old received his first G League assignment of the season on Monday after playing less than two minutes (all against Milwaukee) across Brooklyn’s first three games.

“Just tell him to be patient,” Wilson said of Whitehead. “You never really know when you’re going to play. I feel like that was one thing me and Noah always knew last year, just be ready. Never know. God forbid someone’s hurt or something happens and you need to play. You just have to be ready to step up and play. So just being patient, understanding that time will always come to play.”