Miles Bridges’ 35 points not enough. What we learned in the Hornets’ loss to Atlanta
.JPG "Atlanta Hawks Trae Young (11) defends Charlotte Hornets Gordon Hayward (20) during the second half of an NBA basketball game Saturday, Nov. 20, 2021, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Hakim Wright Sr.)")
Fresh off their successful four-game homestand, a Saturday night trip to square off against a Southeast Division rival was in order for the Charlotte Hornets.
Coach James Borrego insisted this one wasn’t any different than the rest, even if it did represent their first entanglement with Atlanta, the team that made it to the Eastern Conference Finals last season.
“I don’t necessarily look at these as division games,” Borrego said. “These are all guys we are competing with. This Eastern Conference is loaded. So there is no off nights. The Hawks are a very good team. They’re next in line. That’s all we focus on.
“Atlanta is a very good team. Every game is an important game. So we value every game and that’s the goal here, is the guys understand the value and importance of every possession, every game. That’s really the mentality right now.”
It appears they still have a bit of work to do.
Unable to match Atlanta’s pace and firepower, the Hornets succumbed to the Hawks 115-105 at State Farm Arena and had their season-best five-game win streak snapped.
“We know how good these guys are,” Miles Bridges said. “They had a run last year in the playoffs and they were the fourth team in the East. We know how good we are and I feel like we stack up good against them. I think it’s going to be a battle every time we play against them.
“They’ve got a great team. They’ve got a great player in Trae Young, John Collins. Clint Capella is a solid big man and they’ve got great role players. So it’s going to be a battle every time we play these guys.”
Sure there were areas to like, such as the 21 offensive rebounds, 24 second-chance points and 62 points in the paint. But the Hornets (10-8) didn’t execute well enough until the fourth quarter and couldn’t overcome their early offensive woes.
“It’s one of those things where we just had to focus the whole game,” Cody Martin said. “It just shows that you are not going to be able to come back, and use the second half on every single team and we just got to do it for all 48 minutes and focus from the jump. And figure out how to maintain and weather the storm whenever they have their runs and figure things out on the fly and kind of just adjust when we need to adjust.”
Here are three things we learned in the Hornets’ loss:
MILES BACK ON, OTHER STARTERS OFF
After a rough outing a night earlier against Indiana, Miles Bridges rediscovered his touch and poured in a career-high 35 points. Bridges paced the Hornets and served as the main offensive weapon, nailing 15-of-27 attempts.
“Just staying aggressive getting to the rim,” he said. “I feel like these last few games I’ve been settling. I felt like I had to get to the rim and just stayed aggressive the whole night.”
Problem was he was essentially the only real one in the Hornets’ starting five who had it. LaMelo Ball did record his third career triple double with 15 points, 12 assists and 10 rebounds. But he combined with Terry Rozier, Gordon Hayward and Mason Plumlee to go 16 for 45 and never fully kicked it into gear.
“I don’t really make excuses, but I feel like it was just off a back-to-back,” Bridges said. “We’re tired. We were in a hard fought game against the Pacers. We made it harder than we needed to, but I feel like it was a back-to-back. And all of those guys, they are going to bounce back against the Wizards so I’m not even worried about that.”
THREE-POINT STRUGGLES
The Hornets’ stroke behind the 3-point line just wasn’t there. When they look back on this one, that will surely be something they lament.
They hoisted 40 of them and knocked down 10. Many were in rhythm, too. Kelly Oubre struggled the most, misfiring on all seven attempts.
“I liked a lot of the shots,” Borrego said. “I’ll go back and look and we’ll chart those 40 and see. I think a lot of those were uncontested threes. And why they didn’t fall tonight, I don’t know. It’s just sometimes they fall your way and sometimes you knock them down.”
TOO MANY BREAKDOWNS
Throughout their winning streak, an increased attention to detail defensively greatly benefited the Hornets. They have dug in more on that end of the floor, faring much better than they had at the beginning of the season when they spent a hefty portion of it ranked dead last in defensive rating.
But against the Hawks, they had issues keeping their man in front of them, especially on the perimeter. The breakdowns allowed Atlanta to alternate between inside buckets and wide-open attempts behind the 3-point line. The Hawks had 60 points in the first half and were one point shy of breaking 90 before the start of the fourth quarter.
“It’s like we were kind of in a gray area of wanting to be aggressive,” Martin said, “not being aggressive, (then) were being aggressive and then were called for some (fouls) early. And then we kind of stopped being a little bit aggressive. So we are just trying to figure it out, and definitely had some defensive lapses in terms of rotations and in the paint and things like that.”
Cutting the opposition off outside the lane is an area they have to focus on.
“Containment of the ball is No. 1,” Borrego said, “that their pride of one-on-one defense is important for us. And we’ve got to have that pride about us that we are not going to get beat one-on-one. And the Hawks present a lot of problems there. They’ve got a number of guys that like to drive the ball and get downhill.
“At the end of the day our defense will be effective or not based on if we can contain the ball. That’s tonight and every night. Can we keep the ball out of the paint? We’ve shown progress in that area. Not just the man on the ball but when the ball does get downhill do we react accordingly and put out some fires. But it does start on the ball. That’s where our defense starts is containment of the ball.”
This story was originally published November 20, 2021 at 10:04 PM.
