The Charlotte Hornets led nearly wire to wire in a convincing win over the Dallas Mavericks. They’ve now won give games in a row and are back to .500 on the season.
The Summary
The Hornets got off to a pretty good start, but they hit a little lull in the middle of the first quarter. Brandon Williams took advantage with nice some nice buckets in transition. But the Hornets said “we have Brandon at home,” and their Brandon more than canceled those out with a flurry of points in the later part of the first. The Mavericks briefly tied the game as the Hornets took three minutes to score their first points of the second quarter. A little 9-0 run remedied that and created some space that they were able to hold through the end of the half despite some pretty disjointed play.
The third quarter was a pretty seamless transition from the first half. The game was a disjointed mess with a bunch of whistles, mostly on the Hornets. They were able to do just enough on offense to maintain their lead despite Dallas’s repeated trips to the line. Kon Knueppel and the bench played some pure basketball and went on a run that gave the Hornets a 20 point advantage after three quarters. The starters got some burn at the start of the fourth quarter to make sure no funny business ensued. There wasn’t any big run or dagger, but the group kept the Mavericks at arm’s length until it was clear that they wouldn’t have time to make a run.
The Good
NBA teams are generally easy to guard if they can’t shoot the three with volume as long as they don’t overwhelm you physically. The Hornets have been pretty unoverwhelmable in the last few months, so they’ve feasted on teams that don’t shoot well. That held true in this game. Charles Lee’s group does a phenomenal job funneling ball handlers to help so there are no free looks at the rim. That means teams are forced to choose between shooting over help or kicking out to spot up shooters. When the spot up shooters aren’t good, the Hornets have been nearly impossible to beat. The Mavericks spot up shooters are not good, and the Hornets capitalized on that. Dallas was 3-of-22 from the 3-point line and had an effective field goal percentage of 39.9%, which is one of the worst marks for any team in any game this season. If it weren’t for all the fouls, Dallas probably struggles to crack 80 points for the game.
The end of the third quarter gave us a taste of what a Kon Knueppel led team looks like, and it was joyous. The lineup was Knueppel, Sion James, Ryan Kalkbrenner, Grant Williams, and Josh Green. Knueppel did a lot of the ball handling with most of the offense getting started with he and Kalkbrenner running pick rolls. Kon made the right read just about every time, and Kalkbrenner dropped some dimes out of the short roll. James, Green, and Williams all knocked down multiple threes. It was one of the best games we’ve seen the bench play in a while. That unit effectively put the game away before the fourth quarter.
The Hornets have a big game on the road against the Celtics tonight, so handling business last night saved them some minutes and mental fatigue.
The Bad
The only reason the Hornets didn’t completely obliterate the Mavericks was the foul discrepancy. The Hornets were called for 31 fouls compared to the Mavericks 19. Some of that were unfortunate whistles, evidenced by the technical fouls that Miles Bridges and Brandon Miller got out of frustration. Still, there were things the Hornets could have done better. They had a hard time staying in front of Brandon Williams and got a little too grabby. Still, you’ll take the physicality over the alternative.