The New Orleans Pelicans have won three games in a row for the first time this season.
It’s no coincidence that this stretch has come during the least condensed part of the schedule since James Borrego took over as interim head coach last month.
The first 13 games under Borrego (of which 12 were losses) took place in a span of 23 days, which included three sets of back-to-back games. That left virtually no time for meaningful practices.
But since that stretch ended, 11 days have passed and Borrego has had six practices surrounding the three victories, including Friday’s workout that was squeezed between a dramatic 133-128 overtime victory against Houston on Thursday and the game against Indiana at 6 p.m. Saturday in the Smoothie King Center.
“We spent a lot of time on the defensive end,” Borrego said before the game against the Rockets. “We’ve been bleeding on that end of the floor.”
Borrego cited “better communication in transition” and rebounding as two areas where the team has been “really digging in.”
“If we can stabilize those two areas, we’re going to have a chance to guard,” he said. “We’re going to give ourselves a chance.”
Those areas of improvement were evident when New Orleans matched its second-lowest point total allowed this season in a 114-104 victory at Chicago on Sunday. The Pelicans outrebounded the Bulls 43-33, but Borrego was concerned about how the Pelicans would match up with the Rockets — the No. 1 team in the NBA in offensive rebounds, total rebounds and rebounding margin.
Houston easily won the rebounding battle, 58-41, on Thursday but the Pelicans held their own after a first half in which the Rockets were plus-15 on the boards and grabbed a 22-point halftime lead. Additionally, after Houston took a 25-point lead one minute into the third quarter, New Orleans outscored the Rockets 86-56 the rest of the way.
“We were getting stops,” Borrego said Friday of the turnaround. “Then we get out and run. It’s tough to score in transition if you’re not getting stops. Your pace is limited. You’re taking it out, feeling sorry for yourself, heads are hanging.
“When you’re aggressive and you’re getting stops and getting out and running, good stuff happens. We tend to share it more too when we’re getting stops. You tend to play more as a team when you’re getting stops.”
Herb Jones, a former NBA All-Defensive first-team selection, was the catalyst for the defensive turnaround. He had a career-high eight steals, which Borrego called “elite.” The steals not only prevented Houston from scoring on eight possessions but also led directly to 10 points for New Orleans.
“That’s a massive momentum swing,” Borrego said. “We can’t just steal the ball. We’re trying to convert those into easy points the other way, and we did that. Herb was phenomenal.”
The Pelicans tied a franchise record by winning a game in which they trailed by as many as 25 points, and they overcame that margin in the second half for the first time in franchise history.
But Borrego noted the flip side to the historic comeback: “We’ve got to get off to better starts.”
“We take a punch and then we find our way back, which is a great characteristic to have in a team,” he said. “You want that resiliency, that toughness to be an elite team, which is where we want to get to.
“(But) we want to be more steady. We want to be more consistent where we’re hitting them for 48 minutes, and we’re not just reacting when we’re down 15, 20, 25 points and then we become the aggressor. I don’t want to live in that world. That’s not sustainable.”
Borrego acknowledged that even in the game against Chicago the defense “still had some breakdowns.”
“One-on-one defense is one of the areas we’re really identifying for our guys where there’s accountability on guarding your guy one-on-one,” he said. “There’s no hiding from it. You can watch the video and say, did I guard my guy or did I not?
“And these guys are seeing their numbers there. There’s no excuse behind it. You’ve got to be able to guard one-on-one, and there’s got to be a pride in that one-on-one defense.”
The Pelicans (6-22) will try to extend their winning streak against the Pacers (6-21) before closing this three-game home stand against Dallas on Monday night.