Adversity has arrived for the Hornets. Will it threaten to derail their promising season?
A rather nondescript quarter ended, and the Charlotte Hornets were well on their way to their second brutal defeat in as many days when emotions reached boiling-point status.
Most of the starters were relegated to the bench, forced by coach James Borrego to take a seat because a five-point halftime edge crumbled, and ballooned to a 22-point deficit. Near the end of the third quarter, Miles Bridges took a hard spill and crashed to the Spectrum Center floor, causing a momentary scare before he plucked himself off the court and walked to the bench under his own power to get substituted out because he was bleeding. Borrego inserted rookie James Bouknight in Bridges’ place for the final 14 seconds of the quarter.
That’s where things took an ugly turn, leaving the Hornets with a situation on their hands that has the ability to tear apart the good vibes they’ve built up over these past four months.
During the break in between quarters, Bouknight got into a heated exchange with Borrego and appeared to take a step toward him. Bouknight was pushed away in the split-second exchange and ushered back to the locker room by one of the team’s security members. He never came back out for the remainder of the Hornets’ rough 104-86 loss to Miami on Saturday night.
“Obviously we were all a little frustrated, all of us,” Borrego said, “in the third quarter, early fourth and it got a little emotional there. Beyond that I’ll leave it there.”
Not quite. Borrego couldn’t dismiss the squabble was tied to Bouknight’s lack of minutes. The Hornets didn’t make Bouknight available, so it’s unclear what he was thinking.
“As I’ve said before he’s in a tough spot,” Borrego said. “He obviously wants to play. I get that. I understand that. Look, he’s a kid that we believe in, we trust in and we are going to find more minutes for him, more time. So I won’t get into the specifics. Just two competitors trying to help this team.”
Adversity has arrived for the Hornets (28-26) and it couldn’t have come at a worse time. Mind you, there’s never really a great juncture for something to play out publicly like what happened with Bouknight and Borrego. But with the countdown to the NBA trade deadline on Thursday well on, and the Hornets floundering from seventh place in the Eastern Conference to ninth in a matter of days, it’s really not the most opportune moment to be embroiled in such a tense situation.
The Hornets were probably already embarrassed enough, given the feeble eight–point third-quarter effort that transformed a possible win over the Southeast Division leaders into a laugher. Except Miami made sure the joke was on the Hornets, which was surprising considering they were supposed to be stinging mad from the wild defeat to Cleveland rife with late-game officiating miscues.
Losers of five of their past seven outings and mired in a three-game losing streak, the Hornets are trending in the wrong direction. Yet, they insisted they weren’t mentally beaten down, and can snap into the kind of form that’s kept them among the league’s most exciting teams to watch.
“You know going into a season, adversity is going to hit at some point,” Bridges said. “And right now, it’s just how we’re going to deal with it. We got some tough-minded people on our team, so I think we’re going to deal with adversity well. But adversity is going to come for everybody and the only way to get out of it is if you keep grinding. And that’s what we got to do.”
These are the types of incidents that can fracture a locker room and cause players to pick sides. When the team’s dirty laundry is aired out in the open for everyone to consume and play amateur detective, giving them the ability to search for any and all clues to prove there’s some discontent between the coaching staff and players, it could spur more problems.
Or do the opposite.
“I feel like we’re a whole brotherhood,” LaMelo Ball said. “So, I feel like you should just pull you in closer, be tighter and let it out on the floor next game.”
He’ll get no argument from Bridges. He’s confident that will happen.
“Everybody on this team loves each other,” Bridges said. “So it’s not hard for us to stay together and come together. I’m not worried about that. I know we’re going to stick together. We just got to grind it out. This season is going to have ups and downs and right now, we’re at one of the downs. We’re trying to get back up and I think we will.”
They have to or there could be consequences. Remember, this is a team that has postseason expectations. Unraveling at a breakneck pace isn’t good for anyone’s psyche and it’s imperative they halt their free fall quickly.
Otherwise, this quagmire they’re in could doom their chances of finishing somewhere among the top six seeds and avoiding the play-in tournament. Somehow, they have to reverse this spiraling trend.
“I think that is the key — is just sticking together,” Borrego said. “Obviously, it’s been a tough couple of games. (Friday) night was very emotional, today we played one of the best teams in the NBA and we were right there after the first half and lost our way there in the third quarter. We’ve just got to stay together and get back together.”
That includes their 2021 first-round draft pick who openly voiced his displeasure.
“Everybody’s been through it,” Bridges said. “When I was a rookie I wanted to play. And he’s very talented and he’s not getting in the game like he wants to. But I’m trying to explain to him that everybody’s been through that. I went through that. Melo’s been through that and he was rookie of the year. So he’s good. I talked to him. He’s good and the Coach is good. So everything is good.”
This story was originally published February 6, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
