GM: Nets’ coaching hire part of shift in direction

7:52 PM ET

NEW YORK — New Brooklyn Nets head coach Kenny Atkinson got choked up and emotional during his news conference.

The Nets continued their arduous rebuild by introducing their newest and perhaps most energetic coach in years on Monday. The question, though, is whether title-hungry owner Mikhail Prokhorov will be able to exercise an emotion that he hasn’t often displayed and be able to remain patient with the Nets’ new process?

“We’re all on the same page,” general manager Sean Marks said at the Nets’ new practice facility in Brooklyn. “In talking to Mr. Prokhorov, he sat in and he was right there interviewing Kenny with me. He made it well clear that things were going to be done a little differently.”

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“He’s given us the reins to build this thing our way and if it takes some time, it does,” Marks added. “But we’ll be doing everything we can to turn this thing around quickly.”

The Nets don’t just have their hands tied by a lack of assets. Their hands are basically handcuffed without full control over their own first-round pick until 2019. This year’s unprotected first-rounder goes to Boston from the 2013 Paul Pierce-Kevin Garnett trade with the Draft Lottery determining the draft order on Tuesday night.

The Nets can try to improve via trade and free agency. However, forward Thaddeus Young said he has been told that the Nets do not want to trade him or center Brook Lopez.

“I’m certainly not looking to trade them,” Marks said. “But again, you have …

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