These Charlotte Hornets actually have promise. But inconsistency is again a problem
The Charlotte Hornets have long been a maddening team, capable of something cool one night and something clunky the next.
So it went once again in the Hornets’ first two games, as Friday night’s sloppy 111-99 home loss to Detroit took some of the shine off an impressive opening-night home win Wednesday.
The Pistons were actually worse than the Hornets last season, posting an NBA-worst 17-65 record. But Detroit (1-1) dominated Charlotte (1-1) on the glass, made the Hornets’ big men look small and led nearly all the way in a desultory game that reminded everyone of how far the Hornets still have to go.
A crowd of 15,855 in Spectrum Center filed out quietly in the final minutes, a stark contrast to the buzzy Charlotte crowd that had been bouncing off each other after a win just two nights earlier. Instead of a final-minute drama with the Hornets making one big basket after another, this one had for late drama only the ejection of Charlotte’s P.J. Washington’s with 22 seconds left after his hard, frustrated foul with the game well out of reach.
Consistency has been a problem for the Hornets since Obama was in office. Charlotte’s most recent playoff team came in 2015-16, and the Hornets’ postseason drought since then is now the longest in the NBA.
Games like Friday night are why.
Even though there were bright spots — rookie Brandon Miller had 17 points, LaMelo Ball narrowly missed a triple-double and Terry Rozier had eight points in a frenzied 91-second burst — the Hornets got outshot, outcoached and, most of all, beaten up.
Detroit, which starts the youngest team in the NBA, had a 52-40 rebounding edge.
Primarily, the game came down to Detroit’s 6-foot-10, 250-pound center Jalen Duren getting 17 rebounds by himself and Charlotte’s two 7-foot, 260-pound centers — Mark Williams and Nick Richards — combining for only five boards in 37 minutes.
“We got badly out-physicaled on the glass,” Charlotte head coach Steve Clifford said.
Of Duren, Clifford said: “He set the tone for the game all by himself…. Anything that was close in there, he got…. So that’s a problem… The guy’s a monster, but so are they (Williams and Richards). That’s what they’re there for.”
The Hornets also didn’t shoot well (37.5%) as a team. Rozier had 20 points but was 0-for-7 from three-point range. Ball was only 4-for-17 on field-goal attempts, but made up for it slightly by tying his career high with 10 made free throws. Charlotte’s effort was fine, but the result wasn’t.
Still, this Hornets team looks better than the one last year — which admittedly is a low bar, given that team was 27-55. Due to staying relatively healthy and the addition of Miller, who as the sixth man has made the team more dynamic immediately, Charlotte is going to be in a lot of games. It was even in the one Friday night, cutting Detroit’s lead to three points at one juncture in the fourth quarter.
“I’m proud of us for fighting,” said Gordon Hayward, the Hornets forward. “We didn’t give up, and we could have.”
Asked where he thought the team was after two games, Ball said: “Alive.”
And that’s true. There are still 80 more games to go. Now the Hornets just have to rebound — again.
