Draymond Green kicked the shit out of the Hornets in a game where we started Cody Martin in place of the injured Cody Zeller. Kind of a weird move for Borrego to start Martin over Bridges, especially considering LaMelo and Miles chemistry. Oh well we got out played by a team that is better than us, and got exposed for our lack of size again. Draymond had 19 fucking assists and Curry went off for 29 points, It should not be a big surprise the Hornets lost the game but it should piss us off tha Kelly Oubre added 27 points. It’s one thing to let the stars get their buckets, and sometimes that even works; it’s another thing to let the other team shoot over 60% from the field. The only positive defensive take i can have is that the press at the end seemed to create some turnovers and confusion for the Warriors.
-LaMelo and Monk continued their hot streaks with 20 point games
What a brutal game to watch last night, just zero defense at all. The Hornets didn’t even attempt to play defense as we dropped our 4th straight to Memphis. The most frustrating part of the loss was the Grizzlies kept doing the same damn thing and we just kept letting them shoot 3 pointers. The Grizzlies hit 23 threes on us at a 47% rate, most of them were uncontested or at the very most lightly contested. The 6’ tall Tyus Jones even went ¾ from deep. For context Jones is shooting 28% from 3 this year and only had 14 made threes on the season before tonight. 18% of Jones’ threes on the season were last night…. If I was a corny ass high school coach I would say the games that teams’ shoot poorly against us are fools gold because they missed the shot, we didn’t make them miss the shot(aka we got lucky they missed shots).
Terry, Miles, and LaMelo are the only Hornets that played worth a damn. Miles had 30% of our rebounds while Zeller was busy getting outrebounded by Jonas Valanciunas 16-3. We might need some help at PF/C coach. The Hornets didn’t even play bad on offense at all, we made a lot of difficult shots and had some great offensive sets, but when the other team is having a glorified 3-point contest on the other end you don’t really have any chance.
-Are we trying to make the playoffs Yes or No? if yes, please trade for a big man ASAP. If not lets start tanking our way to the lottery, but my vote is for playoffs.
-Its not that fun watching Kyle Anderson and his slow methodical ass work us all game long. If we do scouting reports he should have been on the top because he did this to us earlier in the year.
-I would LOVE to know what the designed switching and closeout schemes are.
-Borrego should start pulling people as soon as they don’t get to shooters or something. If players are supposed to be closing out hard on shooters, it’s his job as a coach to hold them accountable to that. If they aren’t supposed to be closing out hard idk wtf to say besides we need to be.
-Grayson Allen doesn’t deserve the benefit of the doubt on ANY tripping calls, that sequence was kinda funny. He cant even be that mad about it, something something you reap what you sow
-We are still in 7th in the east and 1st in the southeast. If the playoffs started today that would probably be a success, but it’s frustrating because it seems like we could be so much better with a better defensive scheme
3 in a row! All three wins versus 2020 playoff teams to boot (wtf are the origins of this saying(it’s not interesting something about ye olde English law)). Malik Monk had a career game, including 36 points on 61% shooting from the field. Monk looked as confident and comfortable as I have ever seen him in the NBA. We needed Monk to make up for Rozier being out with an ankle injury, we really fucking needed Monk when PJ went down in the second half. Monk had our back. Hornets’ players being able to catch fire might be one of this teams’ greatest strengths. Bridges, Ball, Graham, Rozier, Hayward and now Monk have all had games where they went TF off and took over, most of the time from 3 point range too.
I did think Jimmy G(g stands for gets) Buckets had us in the fourth quarter when he rattled off 4 shots in a row immediately followed by a 3 from Duncan Robinson, putting the Hornets down 10 with 3:49 left in the game. Monk followed with an and one that caused Spoelstra to call a time out and design a play for Herro to hit a 3, which he did. Gordon had enough of Herro so he decided to bully the shit out of him on the next two possessions for two easy layups. Heat missed a few more threes (died by it last night), Graham hit a 3 and pair of free throws that brought the game to within 3 with 38 seconds left. Iggy missed a three and the Hornets headed the other way. Borrego made a smart move in letting the guys have 10 or so seconds of run to see if they could get an open shot. Even though the Hornets didn’t get a clean look and had to call a timeout this was one of the smarter moves Borrego has made this year, especially considering Spoelstra is on the other side. Borrego drew up a play for Monk that worked to perfection, and Monk and his steel balls tied the game up at 113. Butler settled for a 3 and missed it to end regulation.
OT was rather chill for the Hornets. Hornets started off with a dime from Ball to Zeller, then bullied Herro some more, then made we last 4 free throws to wrap up the game.
-Eric Collins and Del are a delight to listen to on the broadcast
-Confident Malik is here to stay
-Random ass Max Strus lit us up for 19 points, but we still won, because Monk lit them up more. Is Max Strus Big Truss????
LaMelo started off slow but did not let it ruin the rest of the game for him. 3 TOs in the first half, 0 in the second. Ball once again showed us his ability to affect the game in other ways than scoring.
Hugo CLT 