Foul trouble, inconsistency plague Hornets in 125-120 loss to Hawks
Despite Melo's 34 points, the Hornets couldn't complete a 15-point comeback in another close game.
CHARLOTTE — With the free-flowing, fluid offensive sets that Charles Lee, LaMelo Ball, and Charlotte run comes periods of stagnation. Friday saw several periods of stagnation. Erratic shooting plagued Charlotte — so did dumb fouls and a turnover problem. For every glass-shattering lob and 30-foot three-pointer, two plays would leave a Hornet fan puzzled. The Hornets, supposedly one of the league’s most youthful, freshest, most fun teams, looked like the antithesis of a Hornets squad at times.
A lot of this has to do with that fluidity itself. If you focus your offense on fast, transition-based scoring, you shift away from tactically creating space — pick and rolls, cuts, etc — and simply exploiting turnovers and number advantages. So, when the Hawks shut down the Hornets’ transition offense — meaning no more between-the-leg lobs and no end-to-end three-man weaves — they seemed lost.
The Hornets trotted out a hodgepodge lineup of rotation players and star men. LaMelo Ball predictably started, joined by Cody Martin and new signing Seth Curry Miles Bridges and Nick Richards made up the Hornets’ frontcourt. The core part was, of course, Ball, who exploded for 34 points in Wednesday’s comeback win over Houston.
The Hawks saw Ball’s dynamism and ability to alter the game’s tempo with his mere presence and proceeded to double-team him off the rip. They kept the Hornets in check by keeping Melo in check. Melo was doubled off the pick and roll without fail. Ball had a scoreless first quarter, had three turnovers, and committed two fouls.
With Melo effectively taken out of the game through the defensive efforts of DeAndre Hunter, the team stalled transitionally and struggled to convert the few shots they created. Bridges and Curry shot horribly in the first quarter. They didn’t have an answer for Trae Young and Hunter, who repeatedly slammed logo threes down the Hornets’ throats.
Despite bringing in Josh Green (making his Charlotte debut after missing Wednesday through injury), the Hornets’ poor shooting continued through the second half. Melo had no points through the first quarter. Backup point guard Vasa Micić couldn’t get the offense going. Tre Mann and Curry couldn’t heat up — at one point, the Hornets were shooting 6-25 from the field. Soon enough, the Hornets were staring down a 15-point deficit in the middle of the second quarter. They desperately needed an offensive spark.
Unsurprisingly, it came through Melo himself.
“He [Ball] did a great job of inserting himself at the right point of the game,” Lee told the Observer yesterday. “I thought early in the game he got other people some really good looks. I thought he himself got some good looks, so it’s not all about scoring for all these guys.
“I think we are just a little more focused in how can we just come out with the appropriate edge to start a game and not dig ourselves into that type of hole.”
Melo surged back in the second quarter, knocking down four three-pointers for 18 second-quarter points. With him, the team jelled. When Melo (finally) got going, the Hornets looked unstoppable. The difference between Micić and Melo is staggering, but the most important one is how Melo manipulates space to his offense — which is huge for Lee’s transition-focused offense. He’s a black hole — defenders are automatically drawn to him. Pair that with his vision and you get around a cohesive, seemingly seamless offense.
The Hornets went on a run in the second quarter as the entire team caught fire. They shot 13-26 from the field, cutting Atlanta’s lead to four points by halftime.
Both offenses stalled in the third quarter. Despite scoring seven points on 2-5 shooting, Ball turned the ball four times. Both teams struggled both with shooting and retaining the ball — it was a game defined by momentum.
On one end, you had Young taking Curry to the elbow before finding Onyeka Okongwu for a lob over Grant Williams. The very next possession saw Mann push the ball past Vit Krejci and find Moussa Diabate for a lob off a pick-and-roll. The two teams went tit-for-tat. Young and Ball went bucket-for-bucket. Rebounds were highly contested, and you were reminded, very briefly, that these two teams are uncannily similar — two points on the same curve.
The Hawks are midway between playoff contention and a complete rebuild — they’ve lingered around .500 for years now after that infamous run to the ECF in 2021. They’ve sold off most of their key parts from ages old — Dejounte Murray, John Collins, Saddiq Bey. Trae Young remains the topic of frequent trade rumors. Although landing Risacher in the draft was a huge boon, they face the difficult choice of staying semi-competitive or blowing the team up to better their future.
The Hornets are similarily midway between contention and rebuild, only this Hornets squad has just emerged from a 60-loss season and is trending towards a playin spot. They’ve added several key contributors to pair with Ball; notably Mann, Green, and (eventually) Salaun over the past year. It seemed fit that two similar teams trending in starkly opposite directions would eventually meet in the middle. This game was their crossroads. An even fourth quarter where Charlotte trailed by three represented the climax.
You didn’t know which Melo you would get going into the clutch — the one from Wednesday, where he had 12 points and four rebounds in the fourth quarter, or the erratic Melo we’d seen hints of today.
It was an even mix. Melo showed hints of being a (dare I say it?) top-five player in the league — shaking up DeAndre Hunter before coolly stepping back and splashing a logo three of one foot. At the same time, he’d collected his fifth foul — a clumsy foul on Jalen Johnson — with seven minutes to go.
The Hornets got super close to tying the Hornets with mere minutes left in the match — Curry and Bridges both knocking down huge threes to bring the lead down to one. But for every Hornets bucket, Trae Young had an answer. He sold calls easily. The Hawks shot 17 (!) free throws in the first quarter. The Hornets backcourt saw foul trouble and opened themselves up for a catch-22. Either give Young space and avoid a foul but let him pull up for three or keep the intensity up and risk fouling out. Either result led to a loss.
Melo flatlined when Charlotte needed him the most. Despite shooting 3-3 from the field and scoring nine points, Melo turned the ball over three times and fouled out with a significant chunk of time remaining.
Fouls after fouls helped Atlanta widen the lead back to double-digits with little over a minute left, and despite Mann’s best efforts, they couldn’t earn their first lead of the match. Atlanta eased to a 120-115, knocking Charlotte down to 1-1.
So what do we take out of this game? We learned that even if Melo is one of the most offensively skilled players in the league, he’s still one of the most inconsistent. We learned Nick Richards is somewhat adept at the five — he shut down Clint Capela for most of the game. Most importantly, we learned that this Hornets squad is far from finished. If they looked at their worst without Melo, what are they at their best?