New Orleans Pelicans: The Night The Losing Stopped

New Orleans Pelicans: interesting notes from the game

The general feeling was relief, finally getting a win and getting that weight off the players shoulders was nice. But there was still some uneasy tension; while Griffin had said he would not be trading Holiday, it wasn’t hard to see some team (Miami, Denver and Milwaukee are just some of the options) making an offer strong enough that the Pelicans had to take it.

The good news for the New Orleans Pelicans was that even with the 13-game losing streak they weren’t out of the playoff race yet as the seventh and eighth seeds were only six games up at the time. Not having Zion Williamson at this point was probably what kept the team together; if they had lost 13 straight with Zion, it would be much easier for Griffin to move the older players on the roster. He needed to see how Jrue and Zion would play together.

Notes while watching the game

This was the first replay of a Pelicans game I’ve seen in full since the league hit pause and, it was comforting to hear the broadcast team of Joel Meyers and Antonio Daniels with Jen Hale doing the sideline reporting.

-The first seven points for the Pelicans were second chance points.

-The Pelicans marketing didn’t feature Zion during in-game promos; the Five Game Flex Plan graphic that popped up about halfway through the first quarter pictured Jrue, Lonzo and Ingram.

-After watching “The Last Dance” and old games from the 1970’s in recent weeks it seems the free throw pace would significantly shorten the length of games.

-Hearing Joel Meyers say “Serenity Now” late in the game after some questionable calls, one of Jerry Stiller’s iconic lines from his time on Seinfeld, was funny when the game occurred. But hearing that line quoted after the passing of Stiller recently made me sad.

-Andrew Wiggins in 2014-15 was the first ever Canadian to win Rookie of the Year. Only four other foreign born player have won the award and most are very recent (Pau Gasol 2001-02, Karl Anthony-Towns 2015-16, Ben Simmons 2017-18 and Luka Doncic 2018-19).

-Brandon Ingram at this point in the season had the largest increase in free throw percentage from last season (83.5% vs 67.5%, good for a 16% increase).

-Does Jaxson Hayes have the bounciest hair in the NBA?

Thanks for reading!