Another night; another victory over the New Orleans Hornets. The good news: we swept the season series and can actually beat the Hornets on a consistent basis; the bad news: there’s 0.001% chance we’ll see them in the playoffs. And since every other western conference team seems to own us right now, that doesn’t bode too well for our playoff chances.
In a lot of ways, this game followed a similar script to last Monday’s game against the Hornets. We built an early first half lead. The Hornets kept making runs at us and threatening, and we kept answering and pulling away. Despite the deficit getting down to 4 or 5 a few times in the second half, it never felt like we were in danger of losing. With a strong kick in the fourth quarter, we were able to win going away.
The real story of this game was our 3-point shooting. We shot very well (especially in the first half), going 12 for 20 from behind the line. So much of our offense is predicated on hitting the open 3-point shot. When we make it at a high percentage, our offense looks so much better, even if the execution is pretty consistent from game to game. Everything falls into place when that 3-point shot is going in. Bogans hit 4 and Hill hit 3; if we can continue to get that kind of production from our starting wings (especially Bogans), we have a good chance to win any game.
Looking Forward:
We play tomorrow night in Memphis. We had a comeback bid fall just short the last time we played in Memphis. We owe them one. Memphis has come back to earth a bit after going on a fairly prolonged hot streak.
New Orleans and Memphis are two of the teams nipping at our heels in the standing behind us; it’s very important to beat them head to head. Plus, when was the last time we won 4 games in a row?
