Team basketball wins games. When the starting 5 can give you 76, and 3 of those starters are in double figures, good things will happen. When your power forward is perfect from the floor and the free throw line…Cody was…good things happen. I guess what I’m trying to say is that with the exception of a horrible start to the 4th quarter (10 turnovers in the 4th), the Hornets played basketball like they have to in order to win games.
Want the details? Well, Kemba was 12 for 26 from the floor for 33 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists with 1 turnover, and a block. Cody Zeller was 8 for 8 from the floor with 20 points, 7 rebounds, an assist, and a block. Gerald Henderson was 4-9 from the floor for 13 points, 3 rebounds, a career-high 8 assists, a steal, and 2 blocks. Michael Kidd- Gilchrist had a bit of foul trouble, so he only had 6 points, 7 rebounds, and 2 assists. Bismack Biyombo did what he does best. He had 4 points, 10 rebounds, a steal, and 2 blocks. Those guys did a good job against the weaker Celtics starters.
The bench did a good job as well. Marvin Williams had 10 points, 8 rebounds, and a block. PJ Hairston had 8 points, 2 rebounds, and 2 blocks. Gary Neal had 7 points and 4 rebounds. Brian Roberts has 3 points, 2 rebounds, and an assist.
Charlotte just did everything right last night. Shooting 48.7% from the field, 95.7% from the free throw line, 48 rebounds, and 22 assists. We held the Celtics to 39.6% shooting from the floor and 33 rebounds.
I’ve been trying to call a player out every game for good work in that game. It used to be the Trade Street Post Player of the Game. Now, I just call them out and request that they read the article on Twitter to receive their praise. Today, I have to call out Charlotte’s “Big 3”. Right now, our Big 3 is Kemba, Cody, and Hendo. They contributed 66 of our points, 14 of our assists, and 15 of our rebounds. I could throw in that they were also responsible for 4 blocks and a steal. A “Big 3” has to contribute all across the board, and these guys did that last night. Good job guys. Now help everyone else out on the team at getting better, and let’s do our best to not have a meltdown like we did to start the 4th quarter. I’m not saying it was your fault, but I am saying that a team with good chemistry can talk to each other and share what was right and wrong, and get past it. Thank you for your hard work last night on the court.
Now that all of those boring details are out of the way, let’s talk about another blown 22-point lead. Everything fell apart in the 4th quarter. There’s no film that even needs to be looked at other than the 4th quarter. In the first few minutes, with the Neal/Roberts duo on the floor, there were 4 turnovers before anyone could even blink. We got extremely sloppy, and the referees really clamped down on us, and called every little foul that they could. The combo of ugly basketball, turnovers, and the referee assists, Boston took that 22-point lead we had and tossed it into the garbage. They had it to single digits before the Hornets got the starters back in and were able to eventually stabilize the ship and win by 9.
We really have to figure out if fatigue was a factor. If it is, we have to look at the bench to see what can be done there. So far, Brian Roberts is not very effective as a backup for Kemba, thus we see Kemba averaging almost 40 minutes every night. If we can’t count on our backup, maybe we need to make a move. In those final minutes of the 4th, many fans pointed out that it appeared as though we weren’t even running plays. It DID look like we were running the one play where Kemba dribbles all over the court, until the shot clock has almost expired. Now I don’t know if Kemba gets tunnel vision down the stretch, if the rest of the team stops trying to get open, or what, but there’s an obvious change on the floor when we stop scoring. That change stops ball movement, and offensive flow. We used to see the same when Al and Kemba were on the floor together at the close of games, but part of the problem with it not working was that Al was not playing 100% healthy. Hopefully a healthy Al will result in seeing a better team than last year. If not, some things are going to have to change on the court so that our offense resembles more of what we’re running right now.
Please keep in mind that the Celtics are not a good team. We needed another win, but the fact of the matter is that they played like we usually do. They’re an 11 and 21 team that is in the midst of a massive rebuilding project. We, on the other hand, were supposed to be a team that needed some pieces to really make some noise in the Eastern conference, yet we’re sitting at 12-24. Injuries have been a factor to a certain extent, but overall, we just have not been clicking like last year. Wednesday, we face the 17-17 Pelicans. Don’t let a .500 team from the Western conference make you believe this will be an easy win. Anthony Davis is no pushover, and Cody Zeller and the rest of the team will have its hands full with him and the rest of this New Orleans team. The schedule doesn’t get any easier when we travel to Toronto on Thursday to face the 24-10 Raptors. Let’s just hope we can maintain the intensity we had last night for 3 quarters against these 2 teams in the back-to-back games this week and close out the week with a win against the 5-32 Knicks on Saturday. These are 3 very winnable games. It will just come down to our focus and intensity. It will also come down to whether our wings are hitting shots.
Let’s Go Hornets!
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