Hornets vs Pistons

On Sunday the Hornets played the Pistons at the Spectrum Center. We wanted to end the first week of the second half of our season on a high note and I was pretty confident coming into this game that we would in fact blow out the worst team in the league.

As soon as the game began I started to get nervous. We were missing open shots and playing bad defense, completely unlike our game two nights earlier. When the half ended we were down 58 – 54. The young Pistons were completely taking advantage of our lackluster defense and that was hard to watch.

Terry Rozier was the one keeping us in this game. He was the only one who was playing with energy and consistently making shots. I don’t know why we didn’t just feed him the ball because he was on fire. Even though it was tight I still had faith that we would pull ahead late. Saadiq Bey ended up hitting a three-pointer that put the Pistons up two with seconds left, but PJ Washington’s putback on the other end tied the game and sent us into overtime.

I hate to say it, but LaMelo Ball completely sold the game in the fourth quarter and overtime. He kept taking unnecessary shots that were all misses. I could tell his teammates were very frustrated with him also, especially Miles Bridges who appeared to want him to give the ball to Rozier, who was hot, and finished with 33 points.

After Rozier’s floater put us up by one, the Pistons had the ball side out of bounds with 6 seconds left. They passed the ball to Kelly Olynyk in the corner and the shot was up. I knew right as it left Olynyk’s hands that it was good. The Hornets ended up losing 126-127.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. I know we are young but if we want to be a legitimate playoff team we have to find consistency and win what should be easy games.