Jan. 17, 2026, 6:35 p.m. ET

The Brooklyn Nets ended their five-game losing streak on Friday after beating the Chicago Bulls 112-109 despite blowing a 20-point lead that made the fourth quarter of the game interesting. Brooklyn had to find a way to close the game after Chicago made a furious comeback in the second half and as a result, some players are out for the Nets in the rematch.

For Sunday’s game at the Bulls, the Nets announced that forwards Michael Porter Jr., Drake Powell, and Ziaire Williams are all out for various reasons. For Williams, he is still going through return to competition reconditioning, something that kept him out for Friday’s win over the Bulls given that he missed Brooklyn’s entire three-game road trip due to an illness.

Porter is out on Sunday due to rest on the first game of a back-to-back while Powell is out for the matchup as the team is managing his left knee as the season goes on. Porter had one of his better games recently as he dropped 26 points (including the game-winning layup) and seven rebounds and while he looked like himself doing so, Brooklyn has maintained trying to keep Porter going given his injury history throughout his career.

Powell had himself a rough game against the Bulls as well as he had just three points (1-of-7 shooting from the field, 1-of-4 from three-point land) and three assists, but his impact in the win went beyond the stat sheet. As the Bulls were trying to score following Porter’s game-winning basket, Powell came up with a huge deflection on an out-of-bounds pass, sealing the victory for the Nets at home. Powell has dealt with knee and ankle injuries this season, but he has mostly been available.

Rookie Ben Saraf is out for Sunday’s game in Chicago as he remains on G League assignment with the Long Island Nets, Brooklyn’s G League afiliate. The last time that Saraf saw NBA minutes for Brooklyn was Dec. 6 so it seems that he will be relegated to the G League until there is a significant amount of injuries or if some of the players ahead of him in the rotation are traded away by the February deadline.

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