Ryan Kalkbrenner Explains What Hornets Got Right in Season-Opening Win

Ryan Kalkbrenner played 13:58 off the bench Wednesday night, and the Charlotte Hornets outscored the Brooklyn Nets by 22 points with him on the floor in a 110-103 win at Barclays Center.

He finished with 4 points on 2-of-3 shooting, 5 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 blocks. Those blocks were half of Charlotte's total for the night. Three of his rebounds came on the offensive glass.

Grayson Allen finished plus-20, and Royce O'Neale finished plus-15. Moussa Diabaté, who started at center and played 33:38, was a minus-16. Naz Reid started next to him at forward. Hannes Steinbach, the 14th overall pick in June, did not play.

Kalkbrenner and Brooklyn's Noah Clowney were each called for a technical foul with 8:42 left in the second quarter. Kalkbrenner also had 4 personal fouls and 1 turnover.

Charlotte outscored Brooklyn 48-44 in the paint. The Nets shot 45% from the field and the Hornets shot 44.1%, but Charlotte took 93 shots to Brooklyn's 80.

Charlotte finished with 15 offensive rebounds and 20 second-chance points.

Kalkbrenner said the Hornets got some good bounces toward the end because they were hustling and in the right places.

"I think going through the preseason we had a lot of stuff that we wanted to clean up," Kalkbrenner said. "So the biggest thing for us was just doing what we do and focusing on our game and trying to do the things that we wanted to do. And we brought great energy tonight. It wasn't always perfect, but we were really competitive with everything we did, so that's all I can ask for, even if not everything's going perfect."

A week before the opener, Charlotte committed 30 turnovers in a preseason loss at Boston. The Celtics scored 27 points off them and won 114-93.

Kalkbrenner was the 34th pick in the 2025 draft after five seasons at Creighton. He won four Big East Defensive Player of the Year awards there and was the 2025 Naismith Defensive Player of the Year.

As a rookie, he averaged 7.6 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 1.5 blocks in 69 games, 31 of them starts. He shot 75.3% from the field.

A year ago, Kalkbrenner started at center when Charlotte opened the 2025-26 season against Brooklyn at Spectrum Center. Diabaté opened last season behind Kalkbrenner and finished it as the starter.

Kalkbrenner missed 10 games with an elbow injury between Dec. 22 and Jan. 8. In Las Vegas this summer, he averaged 5.3 points, 4.7 rebounds, 3.0 assists, and 3.7 blocks.

Hornets coach Charles Lee said Charlotte made a ton of winning plays down the stretch, and he graded its execution at the end of games and quarters in one word.

"Average," Lee said. "But that's fine because it's the first game of the season. It gives us some great film to go and watch, but I think that there's some situational things that we can continue to improve upon, and I know that we will as we get better conditioned, as we get a better feel for one another and the lineups that we have at the end of the game."

"But overall, finding a way to win a game on the road is really impressive," Lee continued.

For Kalkbrenner, the opener showed he can still affect games even with Diabaté starting. Charlotte won his minutes decisively, and his rebounding and rim protection helped create extra possessions on both ends.

Charlotte hosts the Atlanta Hawks at 7 p.m. ET on Friday.

Kalkbrenner is in the second season of a four-year, $9,968,963 contract signed with the second-round exception, and $4,707,364 of it is guaranteed.