Stern: Expect referees back soon

David Stern said that a new owner of the New Jersey Nets could be approved before the end of the year, and that he thinks the full-time referees will be back before the season starts Tuesday.

The commissioner said yesterday that Mikhail Prokhorov, who has a deal to buy 80 percent of the Nets, had a positive introduction with NBA owners during their two-day board of governors meetings in New York.

Prokhorov's application is under review, and the sale must be approved by three-fourths of the league's owners. The league is performing background checks of Russia's richest man, and Stern emphasized that the process was in its early stages.

But Stern said, "We're looking forward to the completion of that transaction."

The commissioner also said owners voted to give the league office emergency powers to determine what happens if teams can't field the minimum eight players because of illness.

A tentative contract agreement was reached last week with the referees' union. The full roster of officials is scheduled to vote today. If they approve a new two-year deal, the officials will be on the floor for Tuesday's opener.

Nets move. The Newark Star-Ledger reported that the New Jersey Nets were considering playing regular-season games at the city's Prudential Center while an arena is being built in Brooklyn, as long as they don't have to pay an $8 million penalty to get out of their lease at the Meadowlands.

Isiah-Magic feud. Isiah Thomas fired back at Magic Johnson for excerpts in a book that said, among other things, that Thomas was omitted from the 1992 Olympic Dream Team because "nobody on that team wanted to play with him."

"I'm really hurt," Thomas, now the coach at Florida International, told SI.com. "I really feel taken advantage of for all these years. I'm totally blindsided by this."

The book, When The Game Was Ours, was cowritten by Johnson, Larry Bird, and longtime NBA writer Jackie MacMullan.