Pacers-105 Hornets-108 [Wrap-up]

Huge team win for the Hornets last night in a game that came down to the wire. Six Hornets had double digit points last night and Miles added in 9 of his own. The Hornets also managed to play some decent team defense causing the Pacers FG% and 3P% to drop dramatically from Wednesday night’s performance. There isn’t even a random role player for me to bitch about working us this game!

Sabonis and Turner got their buckets and rebounds last night but limiting Brogdon and the rest of the guards turned out to be enough for the Hornets to hold on and win. The game got a bit hairy in the fourth quarter but it was not very upsetting to me. It felt like the Pacers, who are the better team, got back into this game and not that the Hornets LET them back into the game. Yes, the Pacers outscored the Hornets by 6 in the fourth quarter but that was more because of the Hornets missing open looks and less because of the Hornets having shitty turnovers and boy have we seen some shitty turnovers this season. Hopefully the Hornets will be able to turn this game into some momentum because they’ll need it, the next four games are against the Bucks, Heat, Sixers, and Jazz.

-Shoutout Malik Monk, he’s been playing really well since he started getting minutes again. Hopefully we can get the ball in his hands for more than just 3’s. He probably should have got more time in the second half last night but I’m just happy to have him out there looking comfortable.

-Sabonis has terrible facial expressions that makes him look like a whiney bitch. I haven’t always felt this way about him, maybe it’s the hair.

-PJ should probably be a little more assertive when he literally cannot miss

-LaMelo played great despite missing all 6 of his threes. Hopefully that will keep him getting to the rim because he did that gracefully AF against the Pacers.

-Props will be back for next preview, my bad completely forgot.

Pacers-116 Hornets-106 [Wrap-up]

Doug McDermott turned the clock back to his Creighton days and scored 28 points vs the Hornets last night, with an embarrassing (for the Hornets) 22 points in the paint. That 22 points in the paint is especially disturbing when you realize Doug does not have a single post move, so the majority of these were lightly defended or completely uncontested layups. In a season full of role players roasting the Hornets, McDermott, and Justin Holiday for that matter, were happy to follow the likes of Gary Clark and Garrett Temple…

There were some positives to take away from this game for the Hornets, especially their lack of turnovers. Another positive is that the rotations were not identical to the previous 4 games. Borrego started Zeller over Biz and even got a little crazy and gave Monk some pt in the first quarter. I am happy that Monk got some more time and Borrego changed up some things but neither of the two moves do anything to address the fact that we have 1.44 big men on this team. What’s the plan against teams with an actual power forward? Allow them to put up an easy triple double like Domantas Sabonis and his Dawsons Creek ass haircut, I guess…

 -The Hornets only had 11 turnovers, but just could not make their shots. PJ and Gordon both shot gross 6/14 with Terry adding a slightly “better” 8/18.

-Need quicker adjustments on the fly during opponents runs

-We get another shot Friday, 1 out of 2 vs the pacers is probably the best we could hope for anyway

-Not a popular take but I think Caleb should get some time, with most of it is getting in opposing PFs grill and pestering the shit out of them.

-Does any of our role players have defined roles? I think the someone needs to have the role of getting inside opposing big men’s jersey and make their life hell.

-Small ball only works when a team has highly skilled tweener type personel, we do not.

-Looks like our two defensive sets are “allow open 3s” or “allow open layups”… -Is anyone having fun? I’m not.