Quantum communication networks are best supported by maximally entangled states, but imperfections in entanglement generation and distribution generally limit the distributed states to being only partially entangled. Therefore, protocols typically consisting of local operations and classical communication are required to create suitably entangled networks. Here, we introduce a power-of- choice (PoC) protocol based on reversing the selection criteria in the Achliopotas process previously considered in classical explosive percolation. The resulting PoC protocol anticipates the entanglement percolation transition, thereby reducing the entanglement resources needed to establish quantum communication. Notably, in contrast to explosive percolation, the PoC protocol admits a local implementation without loss of performance.