The Hornets’ main issue was a problem against the Knicks. Why does it keep happening?
Slumped over and frustrated, an annoyed Terry Rozier knew the Charlotte Hornets had been sabotaged again by their nemesis.
The invisible enemy has given them fits all season and it happened once more Wednesday night, bringing Rozier’s emotions to a slow simmer. That’s what surrendering 40 points in the opening quarter to a team realistically out the playoff hunt will do to you.
“Yeah, it’s that first quarter,” Rozier said. “It’s kind of been a story for a while now. We dig ourselves a huge hole, and we’re playing against professionals. No matter the scouting report they’ve got ... we’re playing against professionals who know how to hoop. So, we dig ourselves in a hole and it’s tough to climb back.”
Just when you think the Hornets have pulled it all together and are sticking to the formula that’s been most successful, the dreaded recurring problem popped up in their 121-106 loss to New York at Spectrum Center that snapped their five-game winning streak. It’s almost like they forgot they had to actually try or thought New York was about to make it laughably easy on them considering the Knicks were the ones who were supposed to have the heavy legs given they were on the tail end of a back-to-back.
Instead, the Hornets’ energy was noticeably absent. Countless defensive rotations were either non-existent or far too slow and they continuously left the Knicks wide open. Offensively, they weren’t fluid frequently enough.
All things that shouldn’t be happening at this juncture, not with the Hornets (37-36) in the home stretch of their schedule and their postseason fate looking promising. Yielding eight first-quarter 3-pointers and 69 points by halftime to the Knicks set a horrible tone at the outset. The Hornets aren’t talented enough to think they can roll out the basketballs and beat everybody.
Sure, they can beat any team in the league. But they can also lose to anyone.
If the Hornets want to have any legit shot in the postseason, it’s imperative they find a remedy for the early-game woes.
“Definitely wanted a better start,” LaMelo Ball said. “I feel like you just got to go out there. At this part of the season, you got to just have better starts.”
The Hornets can’t afford to have efforts like that. So what if they’ve all but clinched a spot in the play-in tournament? That won’t become official until early next week at the earliest because the Knicks and Washington are still mathematically alive to catch them. That won’t mean much without getting rid of those first-quarter hiccups.
In a jumbled playoff picture, squandering an opportunity to gain ground on the teams around them — with eighth-place Brooklyn and 10th-place Atlanta each losing on Wednesday — is not a good thing. These are the types of games that may well come back to haunt the ninth-place Hornets as they jockey for position, especially with things not getting much easier for them following Wednesday’s news that Brooklyn’s Kyrie Irving is going to be eligible to play in a Nets’ home game for the first time this season because New York City is exempting athletes and performers from its private sector vaccine mandate.
And Brooklyn’s next home opponent? That would be the Hornets on Sunday. They are one game behind the Nets in the playoff chase, so that game should boast a postseason-like atmosphere and the Hornets could serve themselves well by correcting this potentially catastrophic problem.
How can they go about it?
“Just lock in,” Ball said. “Know the scouting report. (Thursday) will be big and then the game (Friday), stay locked in.”
They can do that by providing some tangible results against Utah in the finale of a five-game homestand, showing they’ve at least learned from some of their latest mistakes. They’re down to nine games left in the regular season.
“We’ve talked about different ways, different solutions,” Rozier said. “But at the end of the day, we got to go out there and apply it. I don’t really know all the answers for that. But we all five collectively have to come out with way better energy and it’s got to be now because every game matters. Every game is important.”
In order to remember those words and begin heeding them, the Hornets may want to have that phrase emblazoned on a T-shirt. That way they can be constantly reminded and won’t forget they must alter their lethargic opening quarters.
Time’s running out and there’s little to be encouraged about until that’s fixed.
“We’ve just got to be better,” Hornets coach James Borrego said. “Go back to work just like we’ve been doing. So just get back to our basics. Play harder, lock in . … We’ll have a great challenge to respond here on Friday night.”
This story was originally published March 24, 2022 at 8:29 AM with the headline "The Hornets’ main issue was a problem against the Knicks. Why does it keep happening?."
